I'll come to thee by moonlight
by Anatomy Melancholia
Summary: This is a companion piece to the show for the ep 9-12 arc. It weaves in and out of established canon with original insertions and 'missing sequences' included. MickBeth-centric.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: WB owns 'Moonlight.' I make no money off this.

AN: This covers the plot arc between ep. 9-12. If you haven't seen any of these yet, be aware that there are spoilers in the fic.

It was started with good intentions and we are now many, many chapters into it. In all honesty, the writing gets much better shortly down the line. I feel compelled to apologise for this opening although I have been assured it's fine. :)

And I know this story has been put up and taken down more often than a bride changes her mind about the cake, but I forget that FF doesn't format like my other sites. Silly me!

As always, comments are love.

_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx_

Beth sat in the waiting room, staring vacantly at the opposite wall. There was a painting of a young father, his daughter in his arms; bright, vivid splashes on the canvas momentarily cheered up the drab green. In most stories, at this point, she should be feeling either remorse or the elation of revenge. But how could she? If Coraline died...no, that was just it! It wouldn't be Coraline who died, it would be mortal, human Morgan. Mick had killed Coraline. And Beth, well...she'd done her damndest to destroy Morgan now, hadn't she?

"The cure, oh god, the cure," she moaned softly, red nails digging into her palms. She had been terrified, soul-sickened after killing Lee Jay, but she'd known as soon as she looked into Mick's eyes that it was the only option. Coraline - stabbing Coraline had been like a reflex. Every nightmare, every thankful prayer she'd ever said after waking up in her own bed, the twenty years of turmoil poured itself though her. _And what about the jealousy_, her mind whispered.

There were so many half-truths to untangle and she was tired of ferreting out secrets, exhausted by the revelations that kept coming, forcing her backwards into a corner until she felt she had to do something , anything to take the memories away. In a college course on Developmental Psychology, Beth recalled a professor advocating real-life solutions for recurring nightmares - a glass of water at one's beside for people who dreamt about being burned, baseball bats for the monsters under the bed. She closed her eyes, Nobody had ever mentioned stakes...

_Pull yourself together, Turner_, she ordered mentally, _Now is not the time to wallow. Get up, make the insurance call and get some coffee_. Every moment of the next half-hour was like wading through molasses. And inconceivably, she found herself wishing that Josh was here. Human Josh, who cooked chicken and woke up next to her and who would not have been fucking - do vampires fuck? yet another revelation left in store - his ex-wife, who had stolen Beth from her bed to use her in some sick fantasy, and who was incidentally supposed to be DEAD, and stringing her along at the same time..._To be fair_, she thought, running a hand slowly over her eyes, _he hasn't exactly been stringing me along. I kissed him. But every time he says 'This is why it can never work' I know he's been thinking about it, And if we've both been thinking about it...and the way he looks at me...I can't...Josh said it couldn't be missed_. For one second rage blazed through her at Coraline and Mick for drawing her into their games; rage against the vampires for their heedless, cruel ways.

"Miss Turner."

"Miss Turner!"

Fingers snapped in front of her face. Carl Davis looked concernedly at her. _This is not like Beth_, he thought, taking in her pallor and the langorous movements of her eyes.

Beth almost panicked and fled. "I...," she started, voice cracking, then grasping the edges of self-control she looked up and smiled. "Miss Turner? What happened to Beth? she quizzed softly.

"You're a suspect in an attempted homicide. I can't show any unprofessionalism."

"I didnt...!" she began.

"I wouldn't say much more right now," another voice chimed in behind them.

Davis raised an eyebrow, "And here comes the man of the hour. What the hell was going on in your apartment, St John? You have two ladies there (the faint accusation making Beth wince unconsciously), two friends who've worked together just fine in the past , and one of em ends up stabbing the other with a piece of wood?! I think you both better start talking fast."

"It was an accident," Mick insisted, drawing a protective arm around Beth. She looks like she's going to pass out, he thought grimly, her overloud heartbeat thready and rushed, "Beth's helping me with one of my cases and I'd forgotten she was supposed to come over tonight. Morgan was still shaken up from the car accident..."

"BETH! BETH!" Josh's voice rang down the hall, effectively cutting Mick off. Beth's head whipped around, "Josh!" She wrenched herself out of Mick's grip and into Josh's arms, "please take me home."

Josh nodded at Davis, "You know I can't hear any details, Carl. I'm taking her home. She can talk to you tomorrow with a lawyer." His voice hardened, "St John, I wouldn't attempt any explanations just yet."

The lieutenant nodded absently, his eyes fixed on St John's face instead. _So the PI has the hots for Beth_, noting the hurt in Mick's eyes as he watched Beth leave.

Mick felt like his lungs had just collapsed. He looked over at Davis who was watching him expectantly, then turned and walked down the corridor, back to the trauma ward. Away from the sight of Beth and Josh.

Coraline was in surgery. The doctors were fairly positive that she would make a full recovery, although the stake had collapsed a lung. Mick settled himself uncomfortably into a virulent green plastic bucket-seat.

It was going to be a very long night.

At 4am the doctors emerged smiling. She would be fine. Was he family? Husband, brother? Mick took a deep breath, "No. Friends. Her family is...I'm not sure how to contact them but I'm sure her employer will do that." He paused, struggling briefly with himself then gave in, "May I see her?" _Is she conscious? Can she talk? What is the cure?_

"She's been asking for you. This way."

Coraline looked so small and fragile in the bed, tubes connecting her to a variety of machines that beeped and blinked. Mick glanced at them distractedly, half of them were unfamiliar. What was still familiar was the peculiar hospital smell - mortality, death and decay. He hadn't been this deep in a hospital in over 60 years, apart from the time he'd chased a feral vamp in with Beth..._Oh bloody well done, he thought to himself, bring up another topic we can all enjoy. _

The nurse who had been bustling around, peeped up at him from beneath long lashes, "She's sleeping now. I'm not going to wake her so perhaps you'll come back again Mr...?"

"St John," he supplied warily, not missing the way she was smiling at him. Two women was his limit and even then chaos reigned. One in hospital, and the other...with Josh.

The nurse ran her eyes up and down the tall figure in front of her, finally glancing up to see the dismal look that swept across his face. "Don't worry, your girlfriend's going to be fine," she said, bending over Coraline.

Mick wrenched his thoughts away from Beth and focused, "Um, she's not my girlfriend."

"Oh, I'm so sorry! Your wife? The different last names you know.."

"No!!" What was this woman on about? "We're...old friends."

"Well, she's lucky to have you to stand by her," the nurse smirked, moving to put a hand on his arm.

Was that a purr?! The woman was clearly deranged. They were in a hospital for God's sake! He could smell the desire off her and hear the quickening heartbeat; Mick had had enough monstrosities for one day.

"Thank you," he said, swiftly disengaging himself, "please tell Co - Morgan I came by. I'll come again tomorrow."

He didn't drive home after all. Mick found himself parked outside Beth's apartment block staring up at her darkened windows. Josh's car was still parked at the curb and Mick had a sudden, violent impulse to get out and overturn it, just so he could smash something.

He cursed and put the car into gear, ignoring the wrenching sounds as he sped away. In her bedroom, Beth woke screaming from her nightmare. But this time there was no guardian angel - she was Coraline and she'd just ripped Mick's head off. The gunning engine softened in the distance.


	2. Chapter 2

**Bing!**

Mick stalked out of the elevator only to be assailed by a scent he knew too well, and desperately wanted to avoid at the moment. He stopped dead, reached a hand behind him and held the elevator door open, weighing his options. Flight seemed infinitely preferable, but this was his home. And the sun would be up soon.

"You'll give yourself a brain haemorrhage if you think any harder," Josef called from inside. Mick let go of the elevator door and trudged in. " Make yourself comfortable," he muttered sourly as he walked to the blood compartment. Josef took another sip from his glass and started to clap, "You made the news. Again."

"Great."

"No, my friend. Not great. I would say you're off your game but right now it doesn't look like you have any."

"I did not plan for this eventuality, Josef. This was all Coraline's..."

"Beth came to see me today," Josef cut in.

Mick stopped, his eyes narrowing, "Why?"

"She thought Morgan might be Coraline and she wanted to know what Coraline might be after."

Mick spun around, fists clenched together, "Josef..."

"I told her the truth, bro. If she's back, it's for you. Although your blonde doesn't seem to have taken it very well. I think she went back to the house. Smelled of her down in the basement; pretty room for a little girl."

Mick felt his fangs elongate, pupils contracting. He circled Josef's chair. "Morgan IS Coraline, Josef. She has a cure. I would've told Beth myself, tomorrow. Now tell me why I shouldn't rip your fucking head off, bro," his voice ending in a guttral roar.

Josef set his drink down and stood up nonchalantly. "I'm sorry, Mick. Fighting me won't change the fact that you led Beth into this mess. She pulled out a stake and drove it into another human being because you _taught_ her that vampires exist. You fed her morsels of truth about your relationship and now she's halfway in love with you. Since she's known you she's shot a man, staked a woman, gotten high on vamp blood, fed you and almost died a couple times..."

Mick's eyes were grey pools of misery, "She's with Josh. She couldn't get far enough away from me."

Josef nodded, "Perhaps she finally gets it then. She's human, we're vampires, and she doesn't belong in our world."

"I brought you some fresh blood by the way," he added, gesturing to the blood fridge, "that stuff you get, I wouldn't feed it to a vamp dog. If there was such a thing..."

Mick walked restlessly to the firepit, "They're going to arrest her for attempted homicide and my house is a crime scene. Again. What the _hell_ do I do?"

"Move in with me for now. Take the blood and let the cops crawl around here. Listen to me, Mick," Josef said, stepping up to him, "vampires and humans, it's not Romeo and Juliet. It's a fucking minefield. How'd you find out about Coraline by the way?"

"Kissed her. In the shower. Saw the brand," Mick replied, running his fingers through his hair, "Then Beth showed up and we were both wet and half-dressed...just went to hell from there."

"So that's why I smelled heart-break..."

"What?" Mick whirled to face Josef.

"You can smell it in the entrance" Josef said, his eyes glittering, "I may not have your gift but this room reeks of heart-break, revenge, despair and disbelief. Although I think the disbelief was from Coraline. Silly bitch probably never saw it coming...

"Ok, enough chitchat," he commanded, snapping his fingers twice. "Let's go. Sun's almost up. You can sing your dirges at my place. Oh," pointing upstairs, "and I brought you half a frozen cow. S'in the freezer."

"Huh?" Mick was sure he hadn't heard right.

"You have a giant freezer unit with nothing in it? Looks pretty suspicious to me. Notice the fresh vegetables," Josef said waving his hand at the fridge door. He grabbed Mick by the shoulder, "We take care of our own. Mortals just complicate things, it's all life and death to them...right, let's roll."

_xxxxxx_

Beth woke to the smell of coffee with a clear head. Josh was standing at the kitchen counter whistling as he buttered two slices of toast. He looked up as she stumbled in and smiled, but made no move towards her.

"How're you feeling today?"

_Pretty awful. But then I have to explain why._

"Earth to Beth."

"Mmmm...sorry. I feel a lot better, thanks. What time is it?"

"Eleven. Eat up and then we'll go see a lawyer."

Beth took a deep breath, "Josh, I don't need a lawyer. It was an accident, just like Mick said."

Josh stared at her open-mouthed, "Beth, the guy is a PI. He does not make legal charges go away, he does not heal the sick and he does not walk on water. What the hell has gotten into you?"

Beth could see the growing panic in his eyes every second she delayed answering.

"Are you in love with him?" he asked quietly.

"No!" The denial echoed in the kitchen.

Josh looked confused. "Then why..," he began.

"I told you last night, Josh," Beth snapped, "he saved my life. And that woman, I thought she was going to hurt him!"

"_Morgan?_" he asked incredulously, "Beth, listen to yourself. From what I hear, she walked out of a shower with him. Anything she did to hurt him was _not_ against his will!"

Beth's face crumpled. "Stop!"

Josh glanced away and sighed. "I don't know what you're telling yourself, Beth, inside that head of yourself, but when _my_ girlfriend barges into another man's house and stabs _his_...whatever...I mean, what the fuck am I supposed to think? That you still feel the same way about me? When you look at him like he's a guardian angel of some kind? And I don't see you breaking down my door in the middle of the night to check on me."

"It wasn't like that, Josh," Beth said softly, "it just wasn't. I don't know how to explain it, but...I do love you, Josh." She moved towards him and wrapped her arms round his waist. He looked so unsure of himself, doubt creasing his forehead. She smiled and reached up to kiss him. Josh tasted...different. She _al_most hated herself for what she was doing, almost, but she needed this life-affirming feeling.

"Let me show you," she whispered against his lips, pulling him back towards the bedroom.


	3. Chapter 3

And then her phone rang, as phones are wont to do at inopportune moments.

Josh broke the kiss first. "You should answer it," he said sombrely, "it might be the police."

Beth crossed over to her bag and felt her heart contract at the name on the screen - Mick St John. _Not now, not now!_

She disconnected swiftly and walked back a little unsteadily, "It was n-nothing important... where were we?" Josh laughed, luxuriating in the feel of her arms. "We were two feet from the bed," he rasped, nuzzled her throat. His hands skimmed up her arms, roughly gliding over the two chainlink scars near her left wrist, and clasped them round his neck.

And then his phone rang.

This time it was the police. Lieutenant Davis called to say he needed a statement from Beth, but that there would be no charges laid since Morgan and Mick had both testified that the stabbing was an accident. Morgan had strenuously called for all charges to be dropped and was asking for Beth at the hospital.

"Apparently you thought Morgan was a burglar," Josh said as he hung up. Beth stared at him, momentarily lost. "Uh...who was that?" - she ended breathlessly. Josh's eyes narrowed slightly but he forced a smile to his face, "Carl Davis. Apparently Morgan's awake and pleading your case for you. They're not going to press charges but they'd like a statement so they can close the file."

Beth's jaw dropped. "Right, a statement," she echoed, her mind buzzing. D_ear Carl, she used to be a vampire and she kidnapped me when I was six, so I had to stake her! Yeah, right! Dear Carl, I walked into Mick's apartment and she was standing there, dripping, in his shirt, and then I just couldn't wait to stake the bitch_..."Um, when do they need it by?"

Josh's smile stretched into a definite smirk, "I told them you were still in bed but that you'd be up by around two or so." He moved towards her again, "That gives us three - whole - hours."

Beth didn't seem to have heard. She turned to her wardrobe, one finger tapping restlessly tapping her lips. Josh stopped in consternation, "Beth?"

"I have to go out for a bit, Josh," she replied, rummaging through her clothes, "I've er, got to drop tonight's story off at Buzzwire or Maureen will flay me alive! I'll get to the police right after that, I promise. Two you said, right?"

"Yes. I see," he responded tightly, "so all that stuff about 'Let me show you,' that's not on high on the priority list all of a sudden, huh?" "And don't bother," he said, holding up a hand, "to tell me that this is not a good time. It's never a good time."

Ordinarily Beth would have protested but right now she just needed Josh gone. "Look," she sighed, whirling to face him, "it was, _is_, on the priority list. I - just - with the phone calls, they keep reminding me...I need to go to work right now, Josh. Just...clear my head, deal with facts and fiction. I can't - "

"Who called you?" he interrupted. Beth didn't answer but the guilt showed clearly in her face. Josh laughed mirthlessly for a second then left without saying a word.

"I'm sorry," she whispered as the front door slammed behind her. Then she put him from her mind and went back to dressing quickly. _I need to see Coraline. I need to know what she's told them_, Beth thought frantically. But it was only when she was locking her front door that it hit her like a tidal wave - her car was still parked at Mick's! "Fuck, fuck, fuck and fuck," she groaned, thumping her head against the door for added emphasis. _The one place I shouldn't be seen..._

"Everything OK there, little lady?" Mr. Rogers from down the hall, eighty and almost blind, stuck his head out to peer at her. Beth ceased destroying her cranium and mustered a winning smile as she turned to reassure him, "Yes, of course. Just realised I misplaced something. I'm sorry I disturbed you!" She started to inch down the corridor.

"No, no, not at all. Now what was it you misplaced. You know sometimes talking about it can help jog your memory," he beamed, shuffling forward.

Beth suppressed another groaning outburst and inched backwards again. She really needed to leave but...he looked so eager; she _couldn't_ be rude. "Just my...cell phone," she replied quickly, "you know, you're right! Now that I think about it, I must've left it at a friend's house yesterday!" She gave him an open-mouthed smile and nodded slighty.

"Well, there you go now," he wheezed, shuffling back to his door, "glad I was able to help."

"Yes, thanks again," she called after him, with a quick two-fingered wave.

And then her phone rang.

Beth scrambled frantically in her bag but not before Mr. Rogers had turned around to stare at her. "Heh, just my mistake after all," she finished lamely, hitting the 'Answer' button repeatedly. She heard a door slam again, the second in the day and it was only noon. _This must be some record..._

"Beth?"

"Josh?!"

"Look, I'm sorry I stormed out. You're obviously still upset..."

"Josh, I know. I'm sorry too...Truce? How about dinner tonight?"

"I can't tonight," he replied, "I already took the morning off and there's a big case that I'm working on right now. Just remember the statement, OK?"

"OK," she sighed in relief. Bless him for giving her a way out! Discussing their relationship was the last thing she wanted to do right now, even though she knew that if she didn't, pretty soon there'd be no relationship to discuss. She looked guiltily at her phone for a few seconds. Beth had moved into the apartment less than a month after she and Josh had started dating. He'd helped her move in, unpack, settle down. He'd stayed over every night for the first month till she got comfortable. And now - the worst part was the lying. Lying to anyone made Beth's stomach churn but lying to Josh was like kicking a loving puppy. Cruel.

_Mental bitchslap_, Turner, she admonished silently, _focus! Now, all you have to do is call the bastard and tell him to bring the car over. You don't even need to be here - you can take a cab to the hospital. I'm sure he knows how to hotwire the damn thing. Hell, he can pick it up and walk it over if he wants to..._

She exhaled slowly and dialled. "Come on, ring, ring!" she muttered, fingers twisting restlessly.

And then it was ringing, ringing very loudly, and she waited for him to answer.


	4. Chapter 4

_Across town..._

Mick had cursed a blue streak much to Josef's delight.

It wasn't often that he saw Mick riled up enough to really lay into a person, but it was always an education in imagination. "Finished?" he asked sarcastically as Mick stopped for breath after describing in great detail the follies of the human race, his imminent self-combustion in disbelief at said follies and what a certain offspring of a certain Mr. and Mrs. Turner deserved because of her folly. "All this because she didn't answer her phone? Boy, have you got it bad."

Mick took another swig of scotch, "I haven't slept. I've spent all morning working on her alibi and I've spent two hours with the police at Coraline's bedside." He ran his hand over his chin ruefully, "One word, Josef, one word, and she could've had me and you and all the rest of us locked up in labs for the rest of our lives. At least till they kill us."

Josef smiled and beckoned at a pouting freshie, "Can't think why she didn't actually. Soooo...Blondie, you gonna go after her?"

Mick tossed back his half-full glass, "Yeah. I have to, Josef."

Josef nodded. "Take my car," he ordered, "you shouldn't be seen talking to her just yet." The freshie beside him was clearly annoyed at his lack of attention, she swept her long hair to one side and bared her throat invitingly. Josef's eyes snapped back to her, "Ah yes. Lunch."

Mick let himself out quickly. Watching Josef feed was too raw an experience. He still missed the way a woman felt just before he bit into her, the fear and fascination in her eyes. Feeding from Beth had been nothing like that. He ruthlessly suppressed the memories of feeling Beth's skin give under his fangs, the taste of her blood washing his mouth, the scent of her desperation. _Fuck...so much for ruthless suppression._ She'd been as desperate as he was, scared but not aroused, just..concerned - concerned? That was too light a word. She'd practically bullied him into feeding from her...and then she forced him to admit something had happened. In the desert, he'd been too close to death to really know what she was feeling, too starved to care beyond leaving her alive...

With the years comes a new level of maturity that mortals rarely achieve. Every experience, every passing day combined to give vampires an ageless glamour that could be utterly seductive. By definition then, the older the vampire, the stronger the glamour; Josef's harem adored being blood-banks. But glamour is still just a screen for power. Other bites could be painful and terrifying...as Coraline's last bite had been before he killed her. _Or tried to at any rate_.

Mick tugged roughly at his collar. He was still unwilling to dwell on thoughts of Coraline; every emotion was so bewildering. Josef's business attire was uncomfortably snug across his broader shoulders. _Switching clothes isn't much of a disguise, but it's still better than Josef's ludicrous hunchback suggestion..._

He leaned back against the limousine's leather headrest, not fighting the thoughts any more; letting the strained emotions run through him was still easier than facing the enormous guilt he felt.

Beth had been just four, terrified out of her wits by Coraline. After he'd set fire to the house, he'd taken Beth straight home and unceremoniously dumped her with her mother. He'd given no explanation at all, just made up a story about an 'anonymous tip,' and cautioned Mrs. Turner not to tell Beth anything, not even his name. _Children are very resilient_, he remembered himself saying, _maybe she'll forget entirely in time_. Her mother, white-faced, tears streaming down her cheeks, had thanked him over and over as she held Beth close. Beth had been a fighter even then - she'd stared solemnly at him as if memorizing his face. There'd never been a thank you from her, but he preferred it that way. Best that she should have no memories of him at all. _Of course_, he groaned inwardly, _that didn't work_. Beth was resilient. She'd grown up bright and beautiful, full of life and breathtakingly disarming. But she had a decided taste for the macabre and a sense of unease around people. She didn't have many close friends for someone so personable, and even Josh, damnable Josh, seemed to have been kept at arm's length.

_She let you in_, a voice whispered in his mind, _she trusts you completely, she killed for you, fed you, kissed you._

_And what did I do_, he demanded angrily of himself, _I stalked her, lied to her..._

_To protect her_, the voice insisted...

_I just gave her half-truths so that I wouldn't have to talk to her about my choices, my past. She came to me for help with Coraline. She came to me with the final proof, for guidance...I could've, I would have been able to stop her. If only Coraline hadn't been there. If only it hadn't been so clear what Coraline was doing there. The stabbing is as much my fault as it is Coraline's._

"We're here, sir," Henri's voice buzzed through the intercom. Mick nodded even though the chauffeur couldn't possibly have seen him through the tinted partition. "Wait for me downtown, please. I shouldn't be more than an hour."

"Sorry, sir."

_Intercoms, no matter how expensive, always make the speaker sound like a mindless robot._

"Mr. Konstantin's orders, sir. I stay as close to you as possible."

Mick felt his fists clench, then forced himself to relax. It wasn't unreasonable. After all, breaking and entering is illegal, especially if the person whose house you're breaking into has been under suspicion of attempted murder because of you. "Two blocks down the road is a nice, middle-class, residential neighbourhood, Henri," he said, "that's where I'm going. And a limousine would make me far more conspicuous." "Wait downtown," he ordered.

"Sorry, sir. Mr. Konstantin..."

Mick hit the intercom so hard he almost shattered it, and dialed quickly. "Josef," he barked as soon as the call connected.

"You rang?"

"I can't have a limo driving around her neighbourhood, Josef. That's just begging for attention!"

"Well, you would take the limo. I told you to take the Ferrari."

"They are _both_ too expensive for this, Josef. You need to tell Henri to wait downtown because I won't say it nicely the next time..."

"He tells me you've broken the intercom," Josef reprimanded gently, "And after all I've done for you."

Mick stared at the phone in disbelief. Josef did not play with him like this; this suave banality was normally reserved for the boardroom where he could be as vindictive as he wanted.

"I need to make sure you won't do anything...unwanted, Mick," Josef said, breaking the silence. "The way I see it," he continued, "of the three of you, Coraline is making the most sense right now. And that is a very worrisome thought. I'll have Henri wait three blocks away at a garage. Call him when you're done."

Mick was silent for a moment. "I can see why you're worried, but I've got this," he said icily, "although I have no objection to Henri parking at a garage." His voice sharpened menacingly, "What I don't need is your paranoid manouevering drawing any more attention to me."

"Fair's fair," Josef replied, the relief slightly more evident in his voice than he would've liked. "Oh, and Mick?"

"_Yeah?_"

"Go get em." And then he hung up.

Mick slid out and thumped on the Henri's window. Great, a vamp chauffeur too... "I'll call when I'm done," he said. "Oh, and while you're at the garage you might want to get someone to take a look at that intercom."

Mick had a hard time keeping the smile off his face as he watched the chauffeur seethe. "Vamps hate asking humans for help," he chuckled softly as he darted into a narrow alleyway.

A few brief seconds saw him flash over the wall at the dead end of the dank passage, and scale the old warehouse behind Beth's apartment. He looked around carefully, then casually leapt the 20 foot gap between the roofs.

The fire-escape crept past her bedroom window, he knew. Beth had told him once that in summer she sat out on the grating, in the shadow of the building where it was cooler. _Certainly safer than having to leap in through her window_, he thought, walking down the rusty iron stairs. He couldn't use vampire abilities here, beyond the skill to keep his footsteps silent; someone might be looking out their window at the wrong time.

When he got to her window, Mick stopped, facing the unease growing in his belly. She's not in bed. He stepped warily through the window, praying she wouldn't suddenly appear with a stake for him too. Or even worse, that she wouldn't walk out of the bathroom, dripping wet and naked, just to see him standing there. His throat went dry at the thought and Mick shook his head rapidly, as if to knock the mental image away. _As if she needs any more stalking..._

At least Lindsey's car was gone although he could smell Josh everywhere in the room.

"Beth?" he called softly, glancing around. When no-one answered, Mick sniffed carefully, smelling the argument, but also the undercurrent of passion that had preceded it. At that he snorted, exhaling as fast as he could. His own mental images he could handle, but Beth and Lindsey together was far too intrusive, and aggravating. He found himself viciously enjoying Josh's despair, and then the guilt flooded back in. There wasn't a heartbeat in the house. She'd already left. Probably with Josh.

Mick bit his lower lip in frustration. If he'd been mortal, he'd have had the cluster migraine of his life by now. He didn't want to intrude on Beth's life further but he'd never had the opportunity to be in her apartment alone before. And she certainly wasn't the only curious one in their strange relationship. He walked over to her dressing table, smelling Beth everywhere, shutting his senses to Josh. And suddenly grinned. Beth lived simply. There was a pot of face cream, some strange tubes of something, perfume in a cut glass bottle, a bowl of pot purri and, in pride of place, a picture of her mother. "Mrs. Turner, you've got a lovely daughter," he told the photograph gently. Beth seemed to have collected half a library in her young life. There were books everywhere. Mick picked up the nearest one. "Oh God," he groaned. "Not Anne bloody Rice again." Putting it back, he moved through the rooms silently, one by one.

He was drowning in Beth, doused in her secrets, her scent. Everywhere he turned was like a kaleidoscope of her life. She lived with such intensity it marked everything around her. _Even you..._

There were voices in the corridor. An old man, a young woman and something about a phone. He ignored them. Until his ears caught a name that couldn't be missed. The woman outside said, "Josh?!" and Mick stiffened abruptly. _Beth! Coming or going?_ he thought wildly. "Don't forget the statement, Ok?" Josh was saying over the phone. Mick almost sagged in relief - going! Thank God, because he was standing here in her living room smelling her couch like a prepubescent moron.

He needed to talk to her, that's why he was here...Mick steeled himself and walked to the door. But he couldn't make himself open it and let her see him wandering through her private spaces. _She needs some sanctuary goddammit_, he thought viciously. _And if you don't prompt her fast enough the sanctuary will come with an orange jumpsuit and a barred window..._

He rested his head against the door and he could almost feel her rage, the hurt that poured through her. He'd leave now, meet her gently on the street...the hell with who saw them.

"Come on, ring, ring!" she whispered.

Mick's eyes flew open as he stared in horror at the phone in his hand. The ringing carried clearly through the door.


	5. Chapter 5

Beth frowned.

Mick usually picked up after the first two rings. _It makes sense though._ She glanced at her watch. _He's probably asleep_. It's past noon. Hang up or leave a message, that was the question. She felt her stomach convulse a little and an expression of disgust crossed her face. _I report horrific stories live to millions of people and I can't call one goddamn man - ugh, vamp_. She decided to leave a message, if only to prove to herself that she could. Beth rested her forehead against the cool wall and waited patiently for Mick's voicemail to kick in after eight rings.

The ringing was much louder than she remembered. It sounded almost as if it was...Beth looked up with half-glazed eyes at her front door. She still held the keys to the apartment in her hand and it was a matter of seconds before the door was unlocked. Beth steadied herself mentally and flung the door wide.

Widening blue eyes met steely gray, sheer disbelief in their depths. Later, Beth would be able to recall the scene with perfect clarity, her apartment shrouding this intruder as if welcoming him. The sunlight streaming through the window touched on his hair, the couch sprawled behind him, the white and comfortable decor setting off his masculinity... He was standing with his phone in his hand, making no attempt to answer it; of course, he'd known she was just outside! Mick gestured wordlessly at the cell still pressed against her ear.

The call went to his voicemail before Beth came back to awareness with a start. She hit the disconnect button slowly, refusing to break eye contact. To her horror, she was completely at a loss for words. She knew he could her the blood rushing through her veins, her flushed breathing, and the fact that she could not hide this from him as she could have with anyone else made her angrier still.

Mick guessed from the way her jaw steeled that she was getting over the shock; rage was settling in. Well, he deserved it, every last bit of vitriol she threw at him. But right now he needed to explain to her what he and Coraline had fed the police. _And then I need to sleep..._

"Beth," he said, looking away, "I know. But right now, I need to..."

"What are you doing here?" she almost spat at him.

Mick sighed. _Okay, the hard way._

Her eyes were riveted to his face, expressions of panic, accusation, fury, humiliation all crossed hers in quick succession.

"Morgan and I have both given statements. You need to know what we said," he stated calmly.

"I know. Apparently I thought Coraline was a burglar," Beth retorted, making no effort to hide the scorn in her voice.

Mick's eyes narrowed. He leaned forward slightly, an aggressive move that was not lost on Beth, "How?"

"Carl Davis called Josh. Josh told me," she replied smugly, "And you still haven't answered my question." Her head cocked to the side as she asked sarcastically, "Just came by to see me?"

"You should've answered when I called, Beth," Mick was starting to get a little annoyed. "I need to tell you the details so we can make this go away, OK? I came over in _person_," he stated pointedly, "because you wouldn't pick up."

"I was busy," she said, chin rising as they locked gazes.

Beth felt a spasm rip through her body, the memory of last night flooding back when she looked at him. All she wanted, more than anything, was for him to leave so she didn't have to think about how she'd almost murdered another human being, the elation of revenge, Mick's face as he stared in disbelief at her, Coraline bleeding in his arms.

_I know_, he thought. "I see," he acquiesced quietly. He looked away again, refusing to be baited.

The silence hung between them, awkwardly filled with secrets and ghosts.

Beth watched him refuse to meet her eyes. _Coward_, she thought, _always running_. "Alright," she said out loud. She walked into the kitchen and put her bag back down on the table, "Tell me what you need me to say."

Mick felt a surge of frustration sweep through him and struggled to keep calm. _Frustration's not so different from anger, boy-o, and anger's not so different from passion, and passion, well, that implies concern. Deep concern._ He walked forward to where she was sitting and held up a hand as the sunlight reflected off a vase into his face; the crease between his eyes deepened. How had it come to this, that the little girl he'd sworn to protect completely had grown up to see him as anything but the father he was supposed to have been? How had he let her go off so half-cocked searching for answers that she'd almost committed murder?

He seated himself gingerly across from her.

"How is she?" Beth asked softly.

Mick glanced up sharply, "She's alive." His tone softened as he saw Beth drag in a ragged breath, "They say she'll make a full recovery." And as if a wellspring had been released in her, the silence was suddenly filled with sobbing. Beth brought her hands up to cover her face, arching her neck so her hair tumbled forward, protecting her. Mick stared at her open-mouthed for a second - he'd never seen Beth cry before. Even at Coraline's house, when she was half-dead with fear, she hadn't shed a tear, preferring to whimper softly. Then, quick as a flash he was at her side.

Beth felt his arms envelope her, his hands softly stroking her back and hair. "Sshh," he said comfortingly as one would to a child. She stiffened abruptly, the sobs dying in her throat. "I'm alright now," she said, her voice muffled by her hands and hair. As Mick's arms fell away she rose swiftly, keeping her back to him, so that he couldn't see her face as she walked to the bathroom.

When she returned the only signs of her outburst were the red rims around her eyes. "OK, so I thought she was a burglar. What was I doing there?" Beth asked seriously.

Mick was still standing by her chair, but at her words he moved across from her again.

A tentative truce.

It took an hour to work out the details. Mick had a missing persons case, Beth was to say that she'd been coming over to get the details. He'd left his front door open by accident, in his hurry to get Morgan upstairs so she could shower. Mick looked uneasily at Beth as he mentioned the shower but she seemed oblivious, taking notes quickly in her looping, cursive script. Beth had been instantly concerned, he suggested, when she saw the door ajar, especially given the high-tech security he had set up around the apartment. She'd come into the apartment and had instinctively picked the most solid thing within reach, a piece of wood that Mick had left in the entrance. Beth frowned, "Why were you leaving pieces of wood around your apartment?"

Mick took a deep breath as he launched into the least believable part of his story, "It was part of a chair that had broken. I was looking to get the chair re-carved and I kept that piece specifically so I could match the wood again. You are not supposed to know this, Beth. All you know is that the wood was there when you were looking for a weapon. The apartment was dark and you were scared. Morgan came down the stairs and in the darkness you mistook her for a prowler. The fact that she was wearing a man's shirt didn't help. We're going to have to make up a plausible reason as to why you stabbed her instead of hitting her."

Beth kept her eyes fixed to the legal pad before her. "She was on the stairs which makes her much taller. Perhaps I just panicked when I pulled my hand back and instead of curling my wrist forward to land a blow, I just carried through with a stabbing motion."

"Do you believe that?"

"It's plausible."

She hadn't said his name the entire time he'd been here. Not once. Not even to get his attention.

"Only if you have the worst reflexes on the planet," he teased, trying to make her smile.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, "you must think I'm a monster."

Taken aback, Mick could only stare at her in amazement for a second. Then, he laughed raggedly and almost fiercely denied her, "You're not a monster, Beth." The sun slipped a little further and the rays were all but blinding him. Mick shifted his head quickly to the right and held his arm up against the glare. Mirthlessly he chuckled, "I don't see you trying to block out the sun with your hands.That's what a monster is, Beth."

She rose fluidly and moved to pull the blinds down. The cord was stuck and it was such a mundane, trifling absurdity that she was half-exasperated that real life had dared to intrude on the madness...Mick stood up behind her. She watched him out of the corner of her eye as she struggled to draw the blinds. His figure blurred for a second and then re-appeared just over her left shoulder. "Having trouble there?" Mick asked, unable to keep the amusement from his voice. She was so lovely with her hair tumbling around her face like a golden halo. This ripe woman - for a second the scales slipped from his eyes and Mick saw Beth as he would have if he'd never met her before, saw the intelligence and strength in her direct gaze, saw her the way Josh saw her.

Mesmerized, he reached out a hand to cup her cheek softly. Beth inhaled sharply, his thumb dragging at her bottom lip gently as he moved to curl his fingers under her chin and tipped her face towards him. She was wide-eyed, her pupils contracted almost to black slits. Mick stared at her mouth, he could feel her heartbeat thudding through her lips. She trembled and reflexively darted out her tongue to lick her lips, but brushed against his finger instead. She felt the change before she saw his eyes flash - once - and turn white and staring.


	6. Chapter 6

Coraline struggled awake as the nurse bent over her to check the IV again. The doctors had declared her surgery a complete success; they brought teams of baby-faced interns to gawk at her through a flurry of note-taking. She had amazing recuperative powers, they teased, what was her secret? When it wasn't rounds, there were still nurses, patients, visitors, hundreds and hundreds of people crowding through the hallways, hundreds upon thousands of smells, millions of histories. She knew, despite every assurance to the contrary, that she was getting weaker. And still the one person she wanted didn't come.

Oh, he'd been here the day before, held her hands as he fed well scripted lies to the police, his worried eyes pleading for her co-operation. But was the worry for her or the _human_? For the first time in a long while, she was lost and more than a little scared in this alien world...

The nurse bustling about the private room glanced at her in pity. "You're going to be OK," she said gently. Coraline lifted a feeble hand to her eyes and nodded, fingertips glistening suspiciously. "Why don't you get some rest," the nurse soothed.

"Morgan?" the husky voice startled them both. He sounded hesitant, more uncertain than usual, as if he wasn't sure of a welcome; perhaps it was just the unfamiliar name that rolled awkwardly off his tongue. When he'd kissed her - _just one day ago I was fit and well, and he had wanted me desperately_ - after he'd kissed her, she'd heard the amazement and relief as he said her name over and over.

_Who knew the eternally young could still grow up?_ she thought hazily watching him move closer. Independent and strong and nothing like the man she remembered half-crazy with longing and despair. The nurse left the room with a distinct twinkle in her eye. _Morgan Vincent was going to be fine now..._

Coraline tried to smile, but it's difficult to move your features smoothly when a tube is taped into your nose; she managed a small half-grimace instead. They stared at each other in silence, the vampire and his wife, _his wife_. If he'd seen Morgan in Coraline 56 years ago, he would never have left her. Morgan was as funny, sexy, smart and passionate as Coraline, but she was also...humanly conscious of other people. She had friends, held down a job, laughed freely and was excitable as a 15-year old girl. She was - magical.

"Was everything..." she finally managed, gesturing so she didn't have to finish the sentence.

"Yes," he chimed in quickly, " Beth gave her statement yesterday."

"Is she alright?"

Mick's eyes searched her face questioningly. "I don't know," he said, "she seems to be. Why the sudden concern?"

"I _know_ why she did it," Coraline murmured, "it looks like we both want the same thing." Even half-dead her voice was still seductive. It reminded him of crushed bedsheets and hours spent in longing fantasy.

"No," he said shortly. "I don't know how you've spun this in your head, Coraline, but it has nothing to do with me. She just put it all together, finally."

"So _she's_ still the victim." Coraline turned her head away from him.

_More than ever_, he thought, his mind taking him back to Beth's apartment. For a brief moment he'd forgotten the age difference and had just devoured her with his eyes; all grown up and more than a match for him. The arousal he kept tempered below the surface had slammed through him. He felt his control slipping and his growing desire fueled the need to make her feel the same.

Beth had been almost overwhelmed with the allure. Tight as a drum her muscles locked into place, unwilling to move away from him. And then the predator had come out to play. _Take her, take her now! _the beast snarled. _You want her, take her. Look at her - she's almost pleading..._

"You really do like the human girls, don't you Mick?"

He came back to reality with a jolt. The strain was finally too much for him. He moved closer, bending over Coraline till his mouth was inches from hers. "How've you done this?" he asked desperately, "Coraline, what's the cure?"

Those big, brown eyes that hypnotized him stared back.


	7. Chapter 7

AN: Thank you everyone for the wonderful feedback. I realise that I vanished for months and I apologise intensely. Remedying that now.

--

"Excuse me." The nurse was back; she stood in the doorway.

Mick straightened quickly and bit back an oath. _How much had she heard, if anything? And goddammit, didn't they have any other patients to check on?_

"I'm so sorry to interrupt." Her tone really was apologetic, "But Ms. Vincent has another visitor."

Instinctively they both glanced at Coraline. Mick's jaw dropped. She had been awake less than a second ago...she'd been talking..!

"Morgan?" he asked tentatively.

The nurse coughed - or choked more likely. "She's intubated," she said softly, "most of the time she's in a haze from the painkillers and muscle relaxants. She can hear you, but she won't be able to respond, beyond nodding or trying to smile."

Mick's head snapped up. "That's impossible," he stated flatly. "She was just talking. I _heard_ her." Was it his imagination or did a slight flicker of alarm pass over the nurses face?

She shook her head slowly, "I'm sorry. The tube..." she indicated the clear, plastic hose taped to Coraline's nose, "goes down through her throat. It paralyzes the vocal chords."

"But she was talking...to the police. Yesterday!"

The nurse let out a small sign of relief, "I see. No, she was left un-intubated for ten minutes yesterday while you gave your statement. The doctors ascertained that her lung could stand the strain." Her voice dropped a pitch soothingly, "This is just to make her comfortable; the machine is just breathing with her. She's not in any pain, I promise."

He felt cold fear wash over him. This was a hallucination...impossible. Coraline'd just asked about Beth. Victims, _victims_. The cure, he'd been asking about the fucking cure...! Maybe he really needed to sleep? Was she playing more mind games with him? _Coraline_. He swiveled his head to look at her again...her face was still, the broken chest rising only slightly.

The respirator hissed behind him. The nurse stood sympathetically, waiting for him to respond.

"Who is it?" he finally asked, his voice far more unsteady than he would have liked.

"I'm sorry, who is who?"

"The visitor." He licked his lips, trying to sort out the tangled mess in his head. Had he been hallucinating? She had spoken, he'd heard her...

"A work colleague. She's not family so I came to check with you."

_With me?_ Mick shook his head in puzzlement, "I'm not family either."

There was no mistaking the surprise on her face this time. "Aren't you together?" she asked, incredulity flooding in her voice, "She has you listed as her emergency contact!"

_Emergency contact from when? When we first got married? 1986 before I killed her?_ Mick willed himself to wake up in his freezer - it had to be a dream - he could almost taste the cold.

And then he caught the scent of the visitor on the nurse. _Beth_.

She was eying him warily now, an expression of grave concern etched between her brows.

Mick forced himself to play along. "Yes-sorry. I - I thought you meant blood..relatives." He winced slightly as he said the words and ran trembling fingers through his hair, "I'm just...shaken up still."

The nurses expression softened. Obviously distraught partners imagined things, anything to ignore the high mortality rates for open chest wounds. "It"s understandable. Ms. Vincent's asleep, but would you like me to show her in anyway?"

_Who? Oh, the visitor. Beth._ He wasn't sure this was a good idea at all. Beth was so angry, she must be even angrier after yesterday. Eighty-five years is not enough to prepare you for what happens when your semi-comatose ex-wife and her would-be murderer, who happens to have been severely traumatized by the the ex-wife, face off, with only you as referee. Especially when you're caught like a rag doll between them. He had little choice though; the answer was a foregone conclusion. "Yeah, of course."

Beth came in sombrely, obviously not surprised to find him there, but she had trouble meeting his eyes.

_A first time for everything_. The thought hit him painfully as she walked over. He wasn't sure if it was because of her histrionics or his damnable lack of control the previous day.

"Hey," he said softly as a peace offering.

Her expression lightened a bit but still looked forbidding. "Hey." She moved to stand beside him.

"I brought flowers," she continued, "but they wouldn't let me...it's sterile here. And she has the chest wound, so..."

"Yeah I know. Nice thought though."

"Is she asleep?"

He shook his head. "Drugged. They put her on a respirator; she can't speak."

Beth frowned, "But - I mean - yesterday Josh said she told the police it was an accident."

Mick could cheerfully have shot himself. Didn't she ever stop being a reporter? They were playing the game again, another game. He would tell her what the nurse had said, she would nod. Another few minutes and they'd both leave. And neither of them would have said a word worth listening to. This game used to be a lot more meaningful when Beth insisted on being honest.

"They left her un-intubated for about 10 minutes," he said. "I didn't realise it at the time but she basically said two sentences and then was quiet. I think the drugs were taking effect when I was talking."

"Why didn't they intubate her from the start?"

"How would I know? Do I look like a doctor?" he snapped.

"Well, you seem to be here everyday and buddy-buddy with the nurses. I'd _assume_ you'd have the necessary information!" she lashed back angrily.

He ignored the anger and focused on her words., speaking slowly as one would to a child. "She used to be a...She used to be invulnerable, Beth. Now she's as mortal as you and everyone else in this hospital. I need to know how she did it. So yeah, I'm here."

He turned to look at Coraline again. "Besides, I was responsible for her. I should have protected her."

"From me." Beth's voice was hollow.

He didn't reply, just nodded.


	8. Chapter 8

"You really _are_ a bastard."

He looked up startled, eyes fastened to her face.

"Are you seriously standing there and telling me that you don't understand? You can't understand why..?" The flush on her cheeks was doing strange things to him, he could see the blood pooling, smell it.

_Wrong words, worst timing possible, St John_. "Beth, you need to understand tha-"

"No!" She was so angry she was shaking, her fists clenched tightly. "_You_ need to understand, Mick. Perhaps I wasn't clear when I asked you to work with Morgan. You were supposed to look for proof. So that there would be no-more-fucking _lies_. You were supposed to _help_ me. You knew, you knew who she was, and you didn't tell me. Do you know where I went, Mick? What I found?"

_Shit_. "Beth, this is not the time or the place. There are always people around in a hospital," he ground out nervously as he scanned the area for potential eavesdroppers.

Beth threw her hands up wildly. "It's like talking to a wall. So, you were supposed to be helping me put my past to rest, after twenty years; twenty years you've been watching over me to keep me safe. She shows up for two weeks and that's it - you're responsible for her. Have I got that right?" She paused to shake her head at him, "Josef was right. This _is_ a freakshow."

"Beth," he reached out towards her.

"Touch me, and I will scream so loudly...". It was the only viable threat in her arsenal.

He laughed mirthlessly. "You don't get it! I _have_ to be responsible. Did you think, for one second, that I would've let you do what you did if I'd any idea what was going through your head? She's human, Beth. Human. Mortal. That means I have to protect her. That also means that she is the only person who has ever done the unthinkable. If she dies, the cure dies with her."

"Of course! And the fact that she's your wife..."

This time he did grab her arm - hard - and pulled her towards him till they were just inches apart. "No, Beth, OK? No. Not now."

The tension hummed between them. She shifted uncomfortably, and he released her arm as if it burned.

Beth moved away, holding herself stiffly. Mick ran a hand through his hair and breathed out slowly. He had to get a grip. This was the second time in two days he'd almost kissed her. At least she knew this time it wasn't the vamp in control. When the vamp had been in control yesterday it had felt like..coming home. So good. He'd stared down into her face, his breath hot against her lips. Beth was frozen. This was what she had wanted, wasn't it? Since she'd gone to him, high on Black Crystal, desperate to feel his mouth on hers, his arms locked around her. But this wasn't how it was supposed to be. Her body was screaming yes, her eyes were wide with terror. He had let her go abruptly and she'd almost fallen over.

"I'm sorry," he said bringing them both back to the present.

"Which is it?" She turned a pale face to him.

"What?"

"Which is it that you really want? The cure or Coraline?"

He hesitated slightly, then answered quietly. "The cure."

"Are you sure? Because it looks like you want both. Mortal again with the woman you love, start a family all over." She tossed her head slightly at Coraline's supine form.

"You just don't let go." He raised his hands in resignation. "We're in the most public place possible beyond a family restaurant. I've told you twice to drop it. Where's that off switch, Beth?"

"Fuck you." She turned and walked towards the door, only to find herself stopped by his hand on her arm again, gentle this time, but with vampire strength behind it.

Mick's voice was low and urgent, "I needed to protect her because she came back to life, Beth. I thought I had ended...it...her. Do you know what it's like to carry that guilt? I know what she did to you was wrong, I know that. That's why I...but she did it for me. Do you know what it's like to have someone you love..." He was almost breathless from sadness. Coraline's face swam before him, the aching terror in her eyes as he sliced her heart in twain with a broken piece of wood. "Just for a second, I wanted to forget."

The fight went out of Beth. She looked at him sadly, "I did forget, Mick. I suppressed all the memories, so well. I was in Coraline's party house. She had this...folder...with pictures from the first time we met - again. And downstairs. The room is still intact. She held me in that room. Forgetting doesn't solve anything."

"I know," he said, releasing her.

There were still unspoken accusations and secrets between them. But for the first time in days, Beth smiled at him, a tentative, half-smile. And he could have shouted for joy. "Thanks for being honest with me," she said.

He nodded, swallowing heavily.

The buzzing noise finally penetrated Beth's fog. "Oh," she scrabbled in her bag for the phone. Mick tried to phase out the conversation, but when you hear noise your brain automatically attempts to unscramble it; with vampire hearing it's nigh on impossible not to eavesdrop.

"Hello?"

"Beth. Where are you? Are you covering a story?" _The pushy editor..._

"No, I'm not."

"Good. Because I've got a hot one! Office suite burning to the ground as we speak. Get out there and find me another arson conspiracy."

"OK, where? Is Steve there?"

"He just left. He'll meet you there. I'm sending you the address and all details."

"I'm on it."

She looked up at Mick, her eyes glinting at the prospect of a new story. "That was my editor. There's an arson story that I need to go uncover."

He nodded, amused. "You're a workaholic. Anyone else would've taken time off! Where is this inferno?"

The message had just come in. She scrolled through the extraneous information quickly, looking for the address. "Um, here." She tilted the screen to him.

Mick's expression went from amused to stunned as he stared at the address. "I'm going with you," he said looking up at her briefly. "We need to leave now."

"What? Wait...why?"

His jaw was clenched tight. "That's one of Josef's offices."

Beth's eyes widened and she nodded. "OK, you drive. I'll go sign us out immediately."

He turned to gaze at Coraline. Her face was still serene, eyes closed, the dark patches under her eyes making her skin seem like porcelain. iHad she been asleep the whole time?/i He shook his head in confusion and then walked out the door after Beth.

CUE EPISODE 10 - 'Sleeping Beauty.'


	9. Chapter 9

AN: Moving into episode 10

--

**6pm**:

Beth came up behind him slowly. She wasn't trying to hide, he'd hear her, smell her, but this was not going to make things better. Behind her, Steve crunched through the debris. Security had only let her in when she'd dropped Mick's name. Maureen needed her to do her job well, Beth needed to do her job well; the reporter persona was salivating at the unmitigated access she was getting to a crime scene, the rest of her was appalled by the carnage and the thought that Josef was dead. _They aren't supposed to die!_

Mick held the glass shard for a second, his mind spinning. There was nothing here, the fire had burned away every trace. He knew the vial was from poker night; Josef had had them made up. The presence behind him intruded finally and his fist closed tight around the jagged edges. How'd she get up here? She was supposed to be downstairs with the camera guy. And he was supposed to be dead; he could've been here.

"It was poker night. I was supposed to be here." It mattered to him suddenly that she realise that vampires do normal things too, like cheat at cards and gossip. They don't spend all their time terrorising children, drinking blood and ripping people's faces off.

At **9:15pm**, she sauntered up to him again, "bearing gifts" as she put it. It felt as though they'd never left the building. John Whitley, New York City, a wealthy real-estate magnate who was 93 years old. _Josef must be mad. What could he possibly have done to piss off a half-dead millionaire?_

**11:00pm**:

Beth sat in silence for most of the ride to the air-port, her eyes watching the familiar LA skyline flicker past. He let her, he could smell the rawness of her emotions, and it overwhelmed him. She perked up slightly when they went to check-in.

"We're on the next red-eye out," Mick said as he took in Beth's carry-on.

Beth glanced up at him in surprise, "Don't you have luggage?"

"I'm hoping we'll be back by this time tomorrow."

"Still. Ew. What about clean underwear?"

Mick looked away from her, laughing in embarrassment, "Not having this conversation, Beth."

Her eyes twinkled at him cheekily. It was so good to feel comfortable again. The consequences would be waiting for them when they got back, but right now, they were a team - _and we make a great team_ - on the prowl together. And that was a good feeling.

Mick faced her again, "You look like a kid in a candy store."

"I'm just thinking that this is a giant thrill ride," she informed him archly.

"Yeah." He shook his head. "Humans."

They walked to the gate a quarter of an hour early. The 23:55 from Los Angeles International was a five hour flight, landing at JFK just past 8 in the morning. Not for the first time, Mick groaned inwardly at the thought of being huddled into a tin can with insufficient cooling and beating hearts surrounding him. _Damn you, Josef!_

Beth had been very awkward about accepting the ticket. He'd finally given her a choice - either take it or stay behind. _Nothing like a little decision-making to throw a human's concentration off._ Thank God, it's night. Planes aren't a match for a freezer but they're colder than usual. Five hours. Nothing he couldn't handle. Beth looked washed out though. It made sense. She hadn't been sleeping well, there were dark circles around her eyes and she chugged coffee as though it was a lifeline.

Beth looked up from her book. "Why do you keep staring at me?"

"I'm wondering if letting you come was a good idea," he told her frankly.

"Don't start that again! Look, I wanted to come. I want to help."

"Yeah, I know. Why?"

"Because."

"And by because do you mean - because you're nosy and pushy, you're a reporter and you hate not knowing the story behind something?"

Beth grinned. "You have been paying attention."

"And here was I thinking you came along as emergency rations," he sighed fulsomely.

Beth shot him an outraged glare and then hit him with her book.

"Hey! You know we still feel pain, right?"

"GOOD!"

"I was kidding," he protested.

It had been a while since he'd flown. Red-eyes were almost empty these days. The long aisles stretched out behind business class, their symmetry broken occasionally by a snoring executive or salesperson. A few couples aiming to join the Mile High Club dotted economy class. _No babies_.

Once on the plane, Mick felt the old claustrophobia clawing at his gut and fought to keep himself in check. There was a reason he always flew business or first. It had nothing to do with luxury or money - he just needed to be around less people. The cramped economy seats, the large puffs of someone's exhalations that became your inhalations, the smells packed close together, all those people! It reminded him of the trenches, sitting in the Ardennes praying, in a voice that had gone numb with shock and cold, for the bombing to stop, for the men to stop dying. When the offensive started, he had been surrounded by friends, by the end he could have picked the survivors off with his remaining bullets. That didn't ease the cramped conditions; the dead piled in with the living. For weeks, he lived in a half-dream state, convinced the next few minutes would be his last.

"Mick. Mick!" Beth was speaking.

"Yeah?"

"Are you OK? You went a bit...intense there for a second." She looked very concerned.

He shot a nervous glance around, "Did I -?" _Vamp out?_

"No, no." she soothed. "Just, your eyes flashed. I - I've only seen that happen once or twice..."

_Yeah, when I tried to kiss you. And when I fed from you._

"Sorry," he whispered, running fingers through his hair. "It's all the people."

"Oh!" her eyes were round as saucers, "I forgot. It must be so hard to hold on with all the..._blood_."

He grinned. Sometimes it felt like his vamp nature came off second-best in the battle with his humanity. By all accounts, Beth's explanation should be right on the money. "No. Actually, it reminds me of the trenches."

"Wow. I never thought of that."

"Why would you?" he asked distractedly, "Your parents weren't even born then."

Once the plane took off, he felt a bit safer. When they were high in the air, he knew he was in a big, tin can...not a clod of earth or tree in sight.

He was excruciatingly hot! Beth was snuggled into a blanket, sleeping with her back to him. She'd lasted all of ten minutes in the air and then had curled up and dozed off. He reached out a hand and ran it across her hair gently, skimming the golden strands. She looked like a dormouse. Beautiful Beth. He knew she was here because of him. And that brought a smile to his face and a warm glow to his heart. Too bad it didn't bring along a cozy freezer. Mick stretched restlessly and moved their AC vents so that both blew on him. His coat was already on the floor and he had his shirt sleeves pushed up. Finally, he sighed in acceptance and then went to take his first cold shower under the tiny bathroom tap.

Beth woke two hours later and peeked out at Mick. His eyes were closed and his hair was curled damply around his temples; if she didn't know better, she'd swear he'd been pouring water over himself. She sat up and stretched. The blanket slid off and the cold made itself very clearly felt. "Damn," she sighed. There was no point holding on. Three full hours to go, and she'd explode if she waited much longer. Beth grumbled slightly under her breath and eased past Mick.

When she got back, he was alert and waiting.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you," she said sincerely.

Mick dismissed the apology. "I wasn't asleep. Just - thinking."

Beth reached out and put a comforting hand on his shoulder. "We'll find him, don't worry!" she smiled reassuringly, "He just survived an explosion. Josef'll be fine."

"Yeah, until I get my hands on him," Mick growled.

Beth giggled. He was so much like a concerned parent. Then her expression turned serious, "Can I ask you something?"

He looked at her warily, "I'm not going to like this, am I?"

"I don't know. I don't want to pry, but this is the second time it's happened."

"What's happened?"

Beth took a deep breath and whispered, "A vampire escaped from a fire. First Coraline, now Josef."

Mick looked at her intently, his face expressionless. "What's your point?"

"Um, I don't know...Maybe it's not as dangerous as we thought? Maybe older vamps are a little bit immune to fire? Perhaps there's a way to shield yourself from fire? A way to modify your - vampirism...like, a cure for..." her words trailed away as she saw him flinch.

"I don't know." His voice was troubled. "If there was a way to change who we are that was already known, I think Josef would have told me. He was adamant that there is no cure."

Beth smiled and snuggled further under her blanket, "Maybe vamps just have extra good luck with survival?"

Mick laughed softly and covered her hand with his. She shivered slightly.

"Are you cold?" he asked concernedly.

"A little." She was grateful to go back to a less tense subject.

"Here," he said, handing her his jacket, "wrap this around yourself and then cover up."

"But you -" she started and then stopped, noting the deep look of amusement on his face.

"Freezer. Remember?"

The coat smelled of Mick. She knew his scent. He smelled fabulous - of clean, fresh skin and completely male. The irony of his smelling fresh was not lost on her...She breathed him in again, remembering the moment she'd stood in his office and held his shirt. It had been strange to smell him all around and yet know that he wasn't there.

"Are you sniffing my jacket?" his voice broke in on her reverie.

Beth jumped. "No! I was...thinking."

"And sniffing," Mick insisted.

Beth shot him a furious glare. _Pull yourself together, Turner_. What was wrong with her? What was wrong with her was very simple. She'd been haunted for days by re-surfacing memories. Josh hadn't understood, how could he? There were only two people in the world who understood and the second person was sitting next to her. Josh hadn't been there, didn't know. Beth's eyes clouded slightly. That had been a horrible thing to do to him. She hated hiding this part of herself, but he didn't understand this friendship or this connection. He was too busy seeing emotions that weren't there. _Later, Beth, later_, she told herself. For now she was just going to enjoy feeling the ache around her heart loosen. The sick feeling of revenge that had tormented her was gone. _And Mick doesn't hate me_. It was terrifying how much that knowledge soothed her. He'd fastened his arms around her, like she was his rock. 'I trust you' is still just words. But 'hold me and make it better', that told her everything she needed to know. It didn't matter so much about Coraline now. While she still felt guilty over the stabbing, she was almost back to normal again. Was that normal? Was that resilience or was she just that unfeeling?

Mick watched her eyes close again. He gauged that she was drifting between sleep and waking, not lucid at all.

"Beth?"

"Hmmpf?"

"It really wasn't what you thought."

"Hunnngg?"

"Go to sleep."

They landed almost on time and he only grumbled slightly because Beth insisted on stopping to eat. She watched him over her sandwich. This was a different Mick. He seemed so much more, light-hearted? Worried, yes, but not so broody, not so angry. Not vicious. Hard to believe that a few hours ago they had been...perhaps there was something strange about their relationship. Maybe Josh had a point; this was not normal. She _didn't_ know him. The last few days had made that abundantly clear. She thought back to how she'd felt in the hospital - sickened by herself and everything to do with vampires. Josh had been like a lifeline. I can't keep using him like this and pushing him away. It's not working...it has to work. She was losing her ties with humans slowly, vampires taking over her mind - she couldn't think of replacing Josh. He still grounded her.

"You finished?"

Beth rolled her eyes, the half-finished sandwich still dangling from her fingers. "Look! It's 8:30 in the morning. Nobody is going to see us this early."

He sighed and shifted in his chair again. "Do you have a better idea?"

"Yeah. Let me finish eating."

"OK, OK."


	10. Chapter 10

AN: Thank you all again, for the feedback. It's great to know that people are reading. :)

FYI, this was written a long time before ep. 15 showed, so Sam and Linda and their role in Mick's life is not based on the show. Thought I'd mention it because it is quite a bit different from the show's version.

**--**

**1:49**

_May 20th, 1954  
I'm meeting Daddy for lunch tomorrow and then taking the Night Cape Codder from Grand Central to see Aunt Mary for the weekend. Can you imagine? Daddy was terrified, but if women can go to Harvard Law now, I can take a train by myself! Robert, naturally, talked a lot of fustian about being careful and eyed me as he warned about how people cannot be trusted. And that is the whole problem with Robert, he treats me as a child. Also, he's boring. I think I'll break things off with him when I return. Aunt Mary will know what to say to avoid any unpleasantness._

_Mother, naturally, is all in favour of my meeting someone else, despite what the Gorgon calls my 'advancing age'. She was talking about Paris again last night, of the dances by the Seine and falling in love with Daddy while the gardens were in full bloom. Now that Europe is re-establishing itself as a commercial power, I think I would like to visit. I said that to Robert and he looked at me as though I had committed a cardinal sin. Apparently well-bred women don't talk about economic matters. I told him in no uncertain terms that the reason that America did not go to pieces during the war was because the women left behind went to work and didn't just keep the hearth fires burning. He was not amused. I must definitely send Esther a copy of 'Dance to the Duke!' even if it thoroughly annoys him. Mount Holyoke sounds like a lot of fun; perhaps I should have accepted Barnard. Although, something is drawing me away. Mother says I have the travel bug, just as she did. I feel as though life is just waiting, around the corner, with cymbals and trumpets and all the intensity of a conflagration. _

The park was cool and bright. Mick had wandered off to the shelter of a nearby coffee shop; Beth was content basking in the winter sunshine. Thank God they'd remembered to bring coats, she'd have been freezing otherwise. Sarah's diary sat on her lap, the pages held open as she gazed at the grass crowding her feet. This woman wrote as if the words spilled out uncontrollably. Beth squirmed a little, embarrassed at being allowed into such a private place. Sarah'd been a happy girl, sweet, on the cusp of womanhood and glorying in her power over men. Josef had been almost unapproachably sophisticated, a challenge to her.

_May 21st, 1954  
A strange thing happened today. No, not strange - inevitable! Cymbals and trumpets and conflagration, and Charles is at the bottom of it all. It's midnight now, but I can't sleep. Grand Central Station is probably the last place you'd think of to meet someone. I was walking to the waiting room when I realised that I hadn't brought my lighter with me. Usually, it's not a problem; no man refuses a pretty girl. He was standing at the Clock staring up with a look of intense annoyance. He can't be more than a few years older than I am, but he makes Robert seem like a child. I could see that everyone was giving him a wide berth - maybe it was the fact that he looked so furious or perhaps it's the strange power that he radiates. Then he did something so chauvinistic that he made my blood boil; the woman next to him dropped her handkerchief, almost at his feet. She glanced at him smilingly, no doubt waiting for him to pick it up. Instead he ignored her completely. No, in fact, he moved two steps away from her. That poor woman! I marched up to him on impulse, I didn't even know what I was going to say, and then he turned his head and looked directly at me. I asked him for a light._

_The moment he smiled at me, I knew I was lost._

_Charles, Charles, Charles._

_The most beautiful name in the world._

_I'm seeing him on Monday when he returns from Hartford. I'm going to met him under the Clock in Grand Central again; he has a late business meeting with CBS TV on the second level._

Beth skimmed forward, her cheeks burning. Josef? With a human? It didn't make sense. Mick was a young vampire but he seemed very definite that vampire and human relationships didn't work. Josef was much older, but he was captivated enough to date a human girl? Perhaps Mick just wasn't interested...

She gritted her teeth, powerless to stop the images flooding back to her. Mick smiling down at her, the way he unthinkingly put himself in danger to protect her, his implicit trust in her, the feeling of his body seeking comfort from hers. _Not everyone has cymbals, trumpets and conflagrations, sometimes it's unwilling and effortless and so unthinking that it becomes like breathing - you carry it with you and you don't even notice it. When did this part-crush fascination turn into so much more?_

Beth shook her head. It must be the emotions of the last few days, everything had been a roller-coaster. And she and Josh were not in a good place right now, perhaps she was just reading into the current situation? After all, it seemed as though she and Sarah had a lot in common and she was reading Sarah's diary. Suggestion can do that to you...

Then she read the last entry.

No, there was a difference. Sarah was in love, Beth wasn't. Was she?

--

**2:12**

"Listen to this," he heard Beth say.

Mick sat in silence, waiting for her to finish. The words made him uncomfortable; he knew they were Sarah's but listening to Beth's soft voice, it sounded as though she was speaking them willingly.

Beth had to know. She knew how badly he wanted a family and to be part of something loving. Predators take, it's what they do best. Mick had tried for over twenty years to reverse that cycle in himself, terrified of waking up again to the thrill of the chase and the wanton acceptance of his power. But nothing, not even his determination to protect the innocents, affected him as much as the simple trust and hero-worship he glimpsed in her eyes on occasion.

No, not true. He'd lied to himself often over the years, it was how he stayed sane. Nothing pushed him to better himself more than the bond he shared with Beth. But there had been, perhaps still was, an equally strong pull towards his darker natures, the person he knew himself to be under the angst and self-denial. Coraline had read him like a book.

The war had stripped the humanity from many, Mick included. Coming back had just seemed so pointless. Little girls half grown up and ready to taste danger in the back seat of a car. He laughed often, wondering if they knew how tame and ordinary it all seemed. He'd drifted for years, only music giving him an outlet for the inner turmoil. He started staying up nights, picking fights in grungy bars, using his military training and enjoying the pain. The gigs were crap, but who cared. There were enough groupies, enough wealthy women who'd succumb to a charmer. Sam had always warned him, the next morning, that he'd go too far.

Sam had been his best friend growing up. Unlike Mick, he'd never made it to the army. His rich aeronautical engineer dad had pulled some strings and got him working on a military contract. When Mick got back, after another flaming row with his parents, Sam had offered him a room. And to give him credit, Sam had persuaded Linda, his new wife, to go along with it.

Mick's jaw clenched. He didn't want to think about Linda. Oh, she'd been willing enough, he hadn't used much charm. But Sam was a good man who hadn't deserved it. Nobody had deserved that, not Sam, not Linda, especially not an innocent life caught in between.

Then, Coraline. She'd been his saviour. Coraline understood. She understood the demons, made place for them in her life, hell, she even brought her own to the table. It was like a dance, one where it didn't matter who he had been, who he was, because she was all those things too. He found himself laughing again, looking forward to the next exchange, watching the crowds for her face.

_I'll love you forever.  
Forever?_

Forever meant different things. A year, perhaps, to enjoy her with unadulterated pleasure, then - children? _Maybe, if I'd been blessed a second time. If I'd had my way - lots of children._

The creases between his eyebrows deepened, he could barely hear Beth.

_There she is!_ The memory spun out at him.

_Coraline lying in a tub of cool water as he walks in and stares at her hungrily. She didn't move, didn't seem to notice him. Mick smiling. She'd acknowledged his existence well enough the last time he'd been here - loudly and often, if he recalled correctly. Of course he did, vampire memory is a cut above human-grade._

_"Forget something?" Her voice low and off-hand.  
"Honey, I'm home." Sarcastic. Unbuckling his belt quickly.  
Coraline smirking, those perfect, white teeth flashing dangerously. "You're late."  
"I know." His shirt hit the floor. Walking to the edge of the bathtub and watching her.  
Coraline gesturing towards his trousers, "Need some help?"  
Didn't bother to reply. She's already tugging them down his legs, knowing implicitly how to send him over the edge. His head rolling back, eyes flashing as she raises herself and takes him in her mouth. He moved so that he'd land under her in the tub. Of course, Coraline has faster reflexes. Finds himself held face down in the water as her tongue moves slowly down his back._

The game could go on for hours, days, weeks. Eventually they'd fight - over the men in her life and her past, his refusal to hunt with her, her refusal to talk about herself, her insistence that he learn to enjoy what he'd become. Oh he had, he had enjoyed it! But he couldn't talk to her about the things he missed now that they were denied to him. His family, mother sobbing as yet another young policeman apologised for yet another dead lead. His boredom, the sun, the food, the music, the honesty of living.

No, the predator was there, but it was unwanted. What he wanted, more than anything else in the universe, was a second chance; the option to do it _right_ this time.

"That was the last entry."

He nodded.

Beth had finished and was waiting for him to speak. "So, Josef never mentioned any of this? Never told you about Sarah?"

He shook his head slightly, coming back to the present. The memories had run through him like lightning. Now was not the time for second chances.

--

**3:26pm**

"He tried to turn her."

The words were like a sucker punch. Beth stared at Sarah, mouth slightly agape. The room suddenly felt a lot smaller; Sarah's ageless body sprawled on the king sized bed, a haunting, looming presence in the closed space. She looked to Mick, he looked away. She heard Mick telling Josef that this was not his fault, Josef countering with his own guilt...it was ironic and funny to hear that exchange. There was a giggle welling up in her somewhere. She tried to offer what solace she could, "You've been looking after her ever since."

Then the window shattered and she was flat on her back, Mick covering her with his body. The whole story was like a B-movie. The woman in a coma, her dying father, the vampire sheltering her and the hired assassin. She heard shots loudly, but the terror had abated at the first movement of his body against hers. Then Mick was gone and all she could hear were the snarls and a sickening crack. She tried not to watch, and thankfully, he had his back to her.

He felt sheer terror as someone burst into the room, that Beth would be caught in the crossfire. Josef was the one targeted, somewhere in Mick's brain that thought was registered, but if anything happened to Beth...! His gut clenched. He'd grabbed her instinctively, shielding her from the bullets he knew were coming.


	11. Chapter 11

**3:45**

Josef hadn't moved the entire time, he'd stood in front of Sarah and let his body absorb the bullets.

Mick pulled Beth to her feet gently; she looked badly shaken, staring up at him almost uncomprehending.

They were all safe.

--

**4:03**

Beth went to reassure Paula about their safety. It was unspoken, but she knew the vampires didn't want her there while the bullets were being extracted.

Mick worked in silence for the most part. Neither glanced at Sarah. Mick sensed that Josef had said all that he would say for the moment. He didn't blame Josef, they weren't the kind who wore their heart on their sleeve. But, here, in Sarah's presence, this was a different vampire.

--

**4:51**

No, it wasn't love. Beth was running now. No questions left, just sheer panic. All her experiences had shown her that she could lose Mick. To a sunny day, to his infinite regrets, his past, an explosion. He was equally worried he could lose her - to time, to sudden chaos, an uncontrollable moment. But she'd never considered losing herself.

Paula had looked at her with such pity in her eyes as she told Beth about Sarah. About Josef.

I will not end up like that! Beth kept her face composed as Paula brought her coffee. The last week had been madness; she'd thought it had ended when they took the flight to New York. This was supposed to be an easy, straight up case!

Paula watched the girl in front of her stiffen her lips to keep her mouth from trembling. Another one, but this one looks scared. Well, she's been warned...

Beth felt the coffee soothe her trembling as it spread its warmth through her. Maybe she'd been more afraid than she liked to admit when Martan had kicked through the window. They were all safe, even deathless Sarah. Lifeless Sarah. Sarah-in-limbo. It was Sarah, Sarah that was scaring her. Not Martan. She knew, from the moment she felt Mick grab her, that she'd be safe. He'd protect all of them, no matter what. But there were worse things than dying. You could be cut off in the prime of your life, with your whole future unfulfilled, in the midst of love, to live a half-life connected to machines and oblivious to even your own body's functioning.

Now I know why this can never work! And just as she had in the hospital, after stabbing Coraline, she found herself aching for Josh. If, when I am really upset, I wish for Josh, it MUST mean that I do love him. In spite of...everything. In spite of Mick. In spite of Mick.

She smiled gratefully at Paula. "Thank you for the coffee. It was what I needed to calm down, I guess."

The older woman smiled in return, "You're welcome. It certainly puts things in perspective, doesn't it?"

Beth raised her eyes quickly, "What does?"

"Almost dying."

_Was she talking about Sarah or Martan or both?_ It didn't matter, there was only one answer. "Yes. Yes. It does."

--

**7:12**

It had been more years than he cared to remember since Mick had been in a bar. What the heck, he could remember - it had been exactly fifty-four years, five months and three days. He'd tried desperately for the first few months as a vampire to stick to some of his more human habits. And vampires can drink, which makes a bar a safe place. Except alcohol can do more than loosen your inhibitions and fuel aggression, it can make you sloppy.

Coraline had finally had to stop him. The police were hovering too close for comfort - the trail of missing women led back inevitably to the nights he was on the prowl and drowning his sorrows; he'd once been seen charming a brunette who ended up with her chest cut open. The cops finally gave up when a cabbie came forward with a statement that he'd driven the woman near enough Watts for suspicions to be shifted on racial lines. Mick didn't believe they'd ever caught the bastard, they nailed some poor kid who stood up in court in a borrowed suit and was never allowed to speak. He got life.

Mick got life too, in a different way. He still woke up some days and wished he could travel back in time, go back and find the real murderer. Sop to my bloody conscience because I didn't care beyond getting the cops off my tail, getting Coraline off my back, and getting the next blood fix.

"What will it be, then?'

_It's been a while..._"Double scotch, neat." He laid the twenty down almost negligently.

"Right then, lad. Double neat," the bartender bellowed at the woman chatting with two customers at the far end of the bar.

"C'mere, get it yerself!" she hollered back.

The bartender swore and moved his bulk down to the row of scotch bottles.

Mick felt a small smile creeping across his face. It had to have been instinct. The lord knows where he was, but he'd looked up and there was a blinking sign with a four-leaf clover and a loud voice singing about 'Paddy McGinty's goat' and then the nostalgia had forced him in. The dead silence hadn't helped when he entered, he'd forgotten that the Irish were a plain-dressing, plain-speaking people. They eyed the belted jacket and expensive jeans with disfavour, the henley wasn't baggy enough and his hair was entirely too long for a real Hibernian. They might all have had heart attacks if they realised that the disfavour was lifting his spirits; it was an unfamiliar feeling to be judged by human standards, but a welcome diversion to feel unconsciously accepted as part of the human race. If only it was just the clothes that were the problem...

The scotch was warm and smoky. He'd probably drunk it entirely too fast, but what the hell. Vamps can take a good deal more liquoring up before they even begin to feel the alcohol. "Another. And keep them coming, please."

The 'please' obviously gratified the big man. "Em, ye'll be wanting a tab, then?" The bartender was staring at him as though he was an exotic species.

Perhaps there was something in the air tonight. He felt...uplifted and devastated at the same time. In need of company and yet in no mood to seek out anyone. The one person he'd wanted to spend time with was on her way to the hotel, picking up luggage, eating dinner. In another hour she'd be leaving for the airport. He'd easily make the flight if he tried, but right now the humiliation was still burning in his gut. Still, it had felt damn good not to pretend to be impervious to her anymore.

"Lad?"

Mick looked up frowning, then realised he'd never answered. "Sure. Put the next round of drinks on my tab too."

He instantly made forty new friends, two of whom were drunk enough on hefty pints of Guinness to come up to him sobbing 'tha' he wash tha' besht man in tha' wurld. Hic!' And the bartender and his wife were kept busy for the next twenty minutes as men mobbed the floor.

They raised a fresh, new cheer when they heard his name was Mick. 'Right, an' sure he belongs to the Irish, then!' He grinned broadly. They'd been called 'Paddy's' in school but his half-English mother, in a fit of half-Irish temper, had always condemned his father as a 'bastard Mick.' They'd never realised quite how thin the walls were...

He drank two more double scotches before he noticed the bartender giving him the eye.

"C'mere lad, ye'll be wanting to take it slow now. This is strong stuff, so it is."

"I'm fine."

"The wife can fry ye up some bangers and chips if ye want. Take th'edge of the drinks, sure it will."

He declined quickly. "No, thank you. I'm not hungry."

"Right then, what's her name?"

"Who?"

The bartender finished polishing the glass in his hand before looking back at Mick. "The girl."

Mick smiled shortly. Am I that obvious? He tried the usual tack, "There is no girl."

"I can see that, lad. Ye would not be sitting here getting rat-arsed, sure an' ye would not."

_Confess my sorrows to the bartender? What the hell, I'll never see them again._ "It's...complicated.

We weren't together. Just friends."

"Wanted more, now?"

He nodded slowly, bemused. _It's Beth, isn't it? You think you're in love with her. This is not about Beth..._No, it wasn't, it really wasn't. But, _you think you love her._ How the hell could he know? He knew what love with Coraline was like. Beth wasn't like Coraline. He'd never been so careful, so paternal with Coraline. Somehow Beth still got under his skin. He'd finally had to vacuum the couch because the strands of hair left behind from when she visited were driving him mad with the smell of her shampoo.

"Did a real number on you, was it?" The loud voice was now sympathetic and discreet.

Mick looked up, almost surprised to hear the words pouring freely out of his mouth. "I don't even know. Someone asked me if I loved her and I said no. Then...I had to protect her tonight and I thought - I'll never let anything happen to her. I'd kill to keep her safe." And more softly, "Die to keep her safe." He took a deep breath before continuing, "Is that love? I don't know. Maybe I would have thought that anyway." It hadn't mattered so much that Beth had said no, he wasn't really asking her to give up Josh, he just wanted some special time with her, a moment where he could pretend that this was a real cusp, a potential relationship, a glittering date; Josef had given him hope.

"Did you tell her, lad?"

"...I don't really know."

"This is your first love affair then, Mick?" The Irish accent was virtually obliterated by the blatant surprise in the bartender's voice.

He almost snorted with laughter. "No. Just...complicated." Mick held the empty glass up to the light.

"I'll get ye another and then maybe ye'd better tell me more."

_Tonight, I am human..._


	12. Chapter 12

He was waiting for her at the airport with an enormous bunch of tulips. Beth didn't say a word when she saw him, just moved straight into his arms. She felt his shock and then his delight as he pulled her closer.

"I thought I'd lost you," he whispered reverently into her hair.

She smiled slightly against his shirt and raised her eyes to his. He was smiling broadly and Beth remembered this smile. He'd worn it often in the early months of their relationship, before his workload and hers expanded till there was little time for more than a perfunctory dinner date or the obligatory movie night. "No," she responded, lifting her head to kiss him tentatively. "No, Josh."

He kissed her back almost savagely, his hands moving to her hips to pull her hard against him. "Beth."

Her stomach fluttered in anticipation, desire tantalising her senses. Josh had never been this demanding or this possessive. And then Beth's brain shut down.

They only broke apart when a red-faced security guard tapped Josh meaningfully on the shoulder and gestured to the crumpled bouquet lying at their feet. Josh nodded, unable to speak and trying desperately to catch his breath as he bent to pick up the ragged bunch. The guard walked away shaking his head.

He turned back to Beth and grinned sheepishly at her. She smiled up at him , her eyes soft and warm. He had to almost force himself to take a half-step away and compose himself before he spoke again.

"Where's Mick?" Josh asked suddenly, features set tight.

Beth's breathing caught for a second then she replied almost off-hand, "He's still in New York."

There didn't seem to be any sign that Josh had heard. He gazed at her steadily with no change in his expression. She responded to the silent question hanging between them, "I didn't want to stay away longer than I had to."

This time he held out his arm to her as though he were an Elizabethan courtier. She giggled as she accepted gracefully. They left arm-in-arm.

Neither said much on the drive home. Josh talked lightly about work, about the new Chinese restaurant opening near his apartment, the latest gossip in the DA's office (did you know Carter and Pam were getting it on?), the new exhibition opening at the MOCA. He didn't ask about New York and Beth listened, grateful for the reprieve from her own thoughts.

They entered her apartment and Beth promptly sank onto the couch with a happy sigh. _Home_. Josh was still standing, half-smiling at her. "You OK?" he asked, moving to sit next to her.

Beth snuggled closer, feeling the emotions of the last few days filter through her, "Just tired."

"Hungry? Thirsty?"

"Kinda monosyllabic tonight, aren't we?"

_Laughter. Couple's laughte_r.

"Less words for your poor, tired brain to process," he replied, kissing her head gently. "I take it

Chinese is acceptable?" He rose swiftly and walked over to the phone.

_A couple martinis...and a steak for the lady..._

"Hey," she called out suddenly, "Do you want to go out? We could go to that steak place we've been talking about. Just you and me painting the town red?"

He turned and looked at her teasingly. "No Chinese, are you sick?"

"No. Just thought it might be fun." Beth had a strange look on her face, almost scared.

"Hey, hey, of course it would be fun."

He was still two steps away from her when she burst into tears. Josh didn't hesitate. He pulled her onto his lap, holding her close while she ground out unintelligible syllables and soothed her until the wracking sobs subsided. He held her for a long while afterward; Beth still had a death grip on his shirt and her face buried in his chest. Then he tried to lift her chin so she would look at him.

"No," she whimpered, digging her nose into his shirt.

"OK, OK. Ssshh, what happened?"

"I'm a mess! I need tissues."

Josh could have laughed out loud. He felt his heart swell and rested his cheek against her hair. "I'll get you tissues, but you have to get up. I can't carry you."

The words seemed to make her whole body stiffen and she pressed herself against him again. "No, just- it's OK."

He was beginning to get a bit worried now. This was not like Beth. Although, she hadn't been herself lately. First, stabbing that woman and then vanishing to New York on a finished report. It didn't make any sense. Unless... "Did something happen with Mick? Because if he did anything..." he asked quietly, dreading her response.

"NO!" Her head snapped up to stare at him and he could see tears pooling in her eyes again. "No, Josh. I know you worry but he would _never_..."

"I've seen the way he looks at you, Beth."

"And how does he look at me?"

"The way I do."

She was silent for a moment and then she responded harshly, "I don't think so. I think he just wants to be friends, but he's looking out for me. Just like you are." _It's true_, she fought with herself briefly as the words left her mouth. _He'd given her no sign_.

Josh opened his mouth to argue and then remembered what he'd promised himself. _If Beth comes back to me, I will never question her again. Please God. _

"You _are_ a mess," he said lightly, looking down at her blotched face.

She opened her mouth in horror and then dug her face into his shirt again, biting him gently through the material.

"Ow!"

"Serves you right," Beth retorted. "And if you say anything else horrible to me, I'll do it again."

She felt him suck in a lung full of air. "Really?" he asked, his voice huskier than a moment ago.  
A pause. "Let me show you."

Josh caught her hands in his, eyes burning with need as he stared at her. "No running this time."  
Her smile was heart-breakingly wistful, "No, no running."

"You're _mine_."

--

The news was waiting for him when he landed a day later. Dr. Duffy had left several messages on his phone asking him to call back immediately, it was an emergency. Mick cursed, he'd shut the damn thing off for one night! Would the world just slow down and give him a chance to catch up?

He wasn't any happier once he got the hospital on the phone.

"What do you _mean_ she's vanished?!"

"I thought you said she was intubated and drugged?"

"She has a hole in her chest!"

And more wearily, "No, I don't know where she could be. But I'll be at the hospital as soon as I can. Thank you."

When he walked into the room, every sense was assailed by the smell of vampire; it was like a slap in the face. _Vampire? I must be dreaming_. A vampire took Coraline? Why?

Unfortunately, he couldn't bluff or bully his way into watching the surveillance tapes and he was far too tired to push the point. The smell of vampire lingered in the hallways and he followed it as discreetly as he could. It let through the hospital to a side-door, and then...nothing.

Mick went home to his freezer.

--

_Make my thing with Beth work..._

He rolled over onto his side and stared at the permafrost on the steel casing underneath.

Everything comes back to time. Vampires have a lot of it. And when you live potentially forever chaos theory starts to make sense, it plays out before you like a map in time. They smell the past. It's an unlocked door, there are no secrets. There is no 'then' and 'now', just 'change' and 'forever.'

Seductive, isn't it? To be together, forever. When you contemplate a lifetime of existence alone - well, that's the rub. How do you hold on to life when the things that make it special are more transient than you are? She could die. She would die. Age and die. A car could hit her tomorrow. One more story where she pissed off the wrong people. And now Coraline was missing, who knew what was in the offing? He wasn't always around. He hadn't planned on being around at all. And he wouldn't always win, Mick knew that. What would happen when he lost? Would the universe come to a screeching halt? Would the Cleaner be feeding him into an incinerator somewhere? No memorial services, weeping widows.

_Will I be mourned?_ _Have I made that little difference?_

Apparently, monsters do have feelings. We can't afford to, he thought angrily. And then because he couldn't help it, he promised himself. He'd go and see her tomorrow, explain about Coraline, talk to her, just...see her tomorrow.

_What was it that stopped ye from telling her, lad?... We're from different worlds I guess you could say. She wouldn't fit into my world, she'd have to change who she was. And my world is a lot more dangerous... Perhaps that is something she should be making the decision after_, _now..._

_What do I tell her? That I'm flattered by the way she wants me, how intrigued she seems to be. That I'd give my life to protect her? That she makes me feel human again? That I always answer when she calls?_


	13. Chapter 13

Beth stretched luxuriously, relishing the slight ache in her muscles. Josh was still asleep, head tucked under a pillow. He had dark shadows under his eyes as though he hadn't been sleeping enough. Well, last night wouldn't have helped, that's for sure...

She slid out gently so as to avoid waking him and contemplated the day. Shower, coffee, papers. Or should it be coffee, shower, nap. Josh snuffled softly behind her and she turned to look at him. _He's so pale_! The bright beam of sunlight hit one shoulder and dappled his back, highlighting the scratches. Beth started in shock. _Was that me?_ The marks were an angry red, as thought she had raked her nails deep enough to draw blood, tearing at the flesh. One was beginning to scab over.

The images started to flood back. She had virtually taken over. Josh was a good lover. Most of the time he was sensitive and teasing, and sometimes he got rough. But she had...

_Bite me_! Josh's face as he stared at her in shock. _Bite me, please. _The sensation of his mouth nibbling lightly at her skin. _No. Bite me. Like a starving madman, like you're marking your territory. Bite me like it's the only way you can enter me._

_Shower_. She scrambled for it, standing under the hot spray for a while. One tentative hand reached up to the rough spot on her neck. What was she thinking? _I was so angry. I was so sad. Wanted him to overload me so I didn't think anymore_. Afterwards, she curled up against him, all but purring. He'd been quiet and then had started to talk about them. Josh had said she'd been acting strangely all week. Edgy and nervous, refusing to talk to him, refusing to talk to anyone but Mick. He'd been worried she was going to leave him for Mick. He couldn't bear the thought. She'd been quiet, unwilling to break the calm in her body. Let's do it properly this time, he had said, lacing his fingers through hers. She only nodded, her heart too full to speak.

That's why she was angry. Josh couldn't leave the subject alone. Even when she told him she'd skipped out on dinner plans to catch the flight back to him. He just kept talking and talking when all she wanted was to leave that behind. She got it! Vampires and humans don't mix. _It's not my world, I don't belong to it. I don't want to join it._

She pulled a towel around herself, laughing mirthlessly. Why would she want to join it? Sarah must've been crazy. Had she met the psychos yet? Or was Josef so completely different then that he was worth being an eternal vegetable for? Sarah couldn't have met Coraline who kidnapped children and set up elaborate murders, or the scary lady who dragged grown vampires away, the ferals that killed mercilessly, or Mick, who on the surface appeared to be about as noble as you can get. Denied himself fresh blood, talked about humanity and mortality with awe in his voice, saved little old ladies and bunnies and fluffy kittens, and with whom if you scratched the surface, you found pure vampire lingering below.

He didn't seem to care about Sarah at all. He just stood there and said how tragic it was with his voice and his eyes were black, devoid of any emotion. Josef was a vampire, Josef was worthy of his concern._ That's not fair! He's spent the last twenty-two years looking out for me too. Yeah, from a distance. He took photos. From a distance. And that's all he wants to do. That's all he wants to do now. Until suddenly something happens and he wants to go dancing. He wants to go dancing when a twenty-one year old is lying in a bed, cut off from the world and her four hundred year old boyfriend is courting death at every turn. He gives me a choice when he's just shown me that it can never work! And if I wanted to make the choice, I'd be the one sacrificing everything; I could be locked out of existence forever, lose everything I love. What kind of choice is that to make?_

_He wants to go dancing, but he can't even be honest with me._

_And why do I care?! Why do I care? Why did I ever care so much? Josh is so good to me, Josh is a good man. He loves me. And I love him. And I'm stabbing people. And tracking mercenaries. And wanting to go dancing. And dying inside. And dying on the outside. And I am hemmed in on all sides. With one because I can't talk to him, the other because he won't talk to me. And I, I - am just...tired._

_And it hurts so much to be torn. No. No more. I'm with Josh. I'm human, and we love each other. That's good enough for me. That has to be good enough for me._

--

It wasn't exactly dusk. In fact, it was a sluggish evening, the day reluctant to relinquish the last of the natural light. If the death grip on the steering wheel was anything to go by, Mick was as nervous as if it were a first date.

Things that could go wrong included Beth slamming the door in his face when he told her that Coraline had vanished, Beth inviting him in to succor him, Beth wanting to talk about New York, Beth not wanting to talk about New York, Beth wanting to talk about Josh, Josh being there, Josh being alive, Josh having ever have lived.

_Goddamn it! I'm eighty-five, I'm not supposed to have to bother with this. My wife should be pottering about making me a cup of tea before I go in for dialysis or something... Thank you, Josef, once again, for that lovely list of calamities._

The prick had finally called this morning to say 'thank you.' Typical Josef timing. Everything had been fine until he'd asked, "So, how's the girlfriend?" Typical bloody Josef phrasing. The long silence after Mick had responded with a simple, "Fine. But she's not my girlfriend," had told Mick everything he needed to know. He'd fucked it up. If Josef was speechless, then he'd really fucked it up.

He noticed the red light at the last minute and stopped, tyres screeching. The fact that the phone sitting in his right pocket tempted him so much shredded his courage a little more. If Mick had had any doubts about his cowardice before, he held no illusions now. One phone call, tell her about Coraline, avoid the whole fiasco, promise to help if she needed help, go back into hiding. _Yeah right_! If he did though, he knew Beth wouldn't pursue this time. He'd heard her heartbeat speed up as he suggested a night out and then watched her face fall, heard the hitch in her breathing as something came to mind to block the joy he was revelling in. Josh?

No. It couldn't be. He'd been around them enough to notice that they had virtually no chemistry beyond a simple comfort. Her heartbeat didn't change when Josh came by. If anything, she seemed to avoid him. He could smell the lack of desire from her body. He knew the difference, he'd smelled her lust for him before and memorised the overpowering scent. Mick ignored the voice in the back of his head that reminded him she hadn't broken up with Lindsey. That this was the second time she'd run back to him when she was shaken up.

He closed his eyes momentarily, the last rays of the sun beaming in mercilessly. _Coraline's stabbing - she thinks I betrayed her; I never did explain. How in the hell did I forget that? Because all I can think of is how she looks at me, all I can think of is her husky voice seducing me as she walks up to the shower, how much I ache to be human and bury myself in her. I ache for her. _He'd hidden this side of himself away for over twenty-two years: the mad obsession, the mixed signals, the games. He'd been playing them with Beth unconsciously, tapping into the allure of the hunt. And instead of reeling her in finally, he'd scared her off; told her why this wouldn't work so often he could see how it became instinct in her mind; she would look at him with that warmth and then it would be gone.

And he still hadn't answered the most important question - what exactly did he feel beyond simple friendship and lust? _There's a combination guaranteed to grab any woman's heart, St John. No promises, nothing laid on the line. Just, come here and make me feel better, baby. Didn't you grow out of this twenty-two years ago? Cut your fucking losses. You don't deserve her. _Still he drove.

Mick had gotten himself under control again by the time he pulled up in front of Beth's apartment building.

He took his time getting there. They hadn't spoken since she'd left New York and he could only assume she was alright. He knew she was fine physically, she'd covered a minor story for BuzzWire on some drug-related deaths in West Hollywood. It had been a little disconcerting not to hear from her. Usually it was Beth who did the chasing, who kept their relationship honest. He could only hope that she still wanted the same honesty from him because if she didn't and he showed up saying what he thought he was going to say...His mouth quirked as he took the stairs two at a time. Is this always what it felt like at the beginning? He thought back to the manic first few weeks when he'd pursued Coraline. Madness, sickness, fear, anticipation - check.

Mick started down the corridor and stopped briefly outside Beth's door, hearing her voice through the walls. She was singing along to the radio, something poppy and quick, and it made him smile and shake his head briefly. He sent a quick request to the universe praying it would be on his side.

Then he was knocking, the door was opening and she was standing there.

Love should be so simple. Boy and girl meet, the pursuit begins, a few tantalising glances later boy and girl fall in love...sometimes that's the end, sometimes it's not so simple. Sometimes love dies, quickly and painlessly or slowly and agonisingly, pick your variety there's a love affair to suit everyone. But in rare and extraordinary circumstances, it becomes much more. You can find that it cleanses you, torments you unceasingly, and redeems you. Sometimes the extraordinary circumstance is a love across time, across death. Sometimes it is a burning that compels you, sometimes an unrequited dream that spurs greatness. Sometimes it is coaxed tentatively like a baby bird from a place you thought was dead forever.

--

She'd been quiet most of the day. Josh had put it down to the rigours of the last few days and let her relax in her private space. _I will never question her again. Please God! _By the afternoon she had her sunny temper back. They'd lazed on the couch planning future holidays and recounting childhood dreams. Beth wanted to see Spain, Josh wanted to travel to Japan. They compromised not one whit.

She felt safe, ensconced in his arms. And then there was a knock on the door and she was opening it and her stomach churned and her breath caught and she couldn't run anymore.

_I can do this..._

--

"Hey." There was _something _different about her; she smelled amazing...

"Mick!"

He felt the smile travel across his face. "Have you got a minute? There's something I need..."

He didn't get any further because she opened the door wider and he saw Josh standing at the window. _What are the chances of that happening twice in the same week? _Shirtless. And Mick suddenly knew why she smelled amazing.

Josh turned around and gave him a little two-fingered wave; Mick could almost taste the smugness rolling off him. _All it would take is two seconds, two seconds to crack his skull and snap his neck...and.._

"Mick?"

He looked back at her calmly. "Sorry, didn't mean to interrupt."

"Oh" Beth's face was flaming..._what is he doing here? _"You're not, I mean, there's nothing to interrupt going on so..."

He raised an eyebrow and heard her heart rate increase. But he had no idea what she was feeling. Now that he recognised it, the smell of sex was so strong off her it was all he could do not to drag her out into the corridor and take her up against the wall. Hell, he could probably do it and keep Lindsey at bay at the same time. Vamp-style.

"Hello?" She waved a hand in front of his face. "You keep spacing out. Is everything OK?"

_Truth time, St John_. "No. But I'm not going to get into it right now. Call me when you're alone."

OK, the alone part might have been because he saw Josh heading towards them...

"Mick." Josh slung an arm around Beth's shoulders and smiled benevolently at him. Mick smiled benevolently back and felt his stomach go into free-fall.

"Josh."

"Had a good time in New York? Sounds like quite the adventure. Beth's only told me a little, something about tracing an old family heirloom?"

"Yeah. Giant thrill ride."

"So, what brings you here on a Sunday?"

"Thought I'd stop by after church and make sure Beth got home OK. Doing my good deed for the day." Sarcasm. _Where is this coming from?_

Josh flushed slightly. Beth had a panicked look on her face as she followed the verbal back-and-forth.

Mick breathed in unobtrusively as Lindsey searched for a comeback. No sex stench, just pure panic. _Does she think I'm going to eat him? _He flashed back to the sight of Beth getting into a cab in New York, resting her hand over his. Comforting him, she'd been _comforting him _as she left him! How stupid was he not to have seen that? Not stupid...lovesick. Love. Lovesick Mick. It even rhymed...

What do you do when the one thing you thought impossible happens? More to the point, what do you do when you find your second chance, a chance that has been pushing against every barrier you've built up, thrusting itself recklessly into your life, willing by sheer force of will and personality for you to admit it...and which then vanishes in a split second just when you turn, ready to embrace it? You walk away, again. You stay alone. You try and work out where the breaches in your emotional walls are and you resolve to plug them, immediately. And then you laugh at yourself because you can't; nothing is the same. And you try to stay friends because giving her up is more than you are capable of.

"I was going to ask for your help on a case," he told her. "Missing person. If you have some free time and can give me a hand, call."

She nodded.

Josh chuckled. "Help again? Aren't you supposed to be the PI?"

"Josh!" Beth sounded absolutely furious as she shook the arm off and rounded on him.

Mick took a step backwards at the same time as his brain processed the distance between them and the undeniable urge he had to... Then he shrugged. "Yeah," he said lightly, "But she's less threatening, plus most men don't say no when Beth asks for something." He wasn't sure exactly what he meant by that but he knew the Josh didn't like the answer. If he'd paid better attention he'd have seen that Beth didn't either. As it was, Mick left smugly: Mick - 2, Josh - 0. It was the only consolation he had.

It wasn't until he was three blocks away sitting at another traffic light that he let out the first shuddering breath he'd been holding back. His mind was spinning so much it was hard to latch on to the elusive thoughts; they darted like silverfish. _So much for second chances! She's made her choice... Did you tell her, lad?... No, I never told her. I want to. The smug bastard knows. He's her boyfriend. He's human. _He'd done entirely too much grieving over the last few days and Mick found that he was bone-weary. Turns out that age does catch up with you...

With Josef still in New York, there was only one person in the city in whose life he was welcome. In three months, three short months she'd turned his life upside-down, made herself indispensable, opened him up again emotionally, made him say things, do things, think things that he'd fought twenty-two years and more to bury. She was his blind spot and his soft spot and he should have known that this was always going to happen; as desperate as he was to be mortal again, he was bound to have forged this connection eventually, given himself this hope and fooled himself into thinking this life could be otherwise.

Look at what had happened to Sarah. After that, how could he, in all conscience, ask more of Beth than friendship? _Here's a to-do list for the broken-hearted, lovesick Vampire - Finish the single-malt, freezer and find Coraline. _And Coraline was dead. After her attempted murder two decades ago he'd thought that the grief would almost kill him some days. Right now, he was just numb. Unsure and confused. And angry. Very angry. Very, very, very angry.

He'd only got a further ten minutes away when the phone rang. Mick glanced at the screen and swore - Beth. _The last person in the world I'd want to speak to. Coincidentally the only person in the world I absolutely have to speak to, given that Coraline has gone missing_...

He pulled off the road and called her back.

"Hi." She sounded cautious.

He kept his voice as neutral as possible. "Hey, Beth."

"We can talk now. Josh was called away to some important meeting, probably for several hours."

_Great_. "OK, things are a bit messy right now so you might want to sit down for this..."

"Come on, Mick!"

"Yeah?"

"Come over, I mean. We don't have to do this over the phone."

Damn. "See you in ten."


	14. Chapter 14

Beth's apartment held a lot of uneasy memories for Mick. He'd been busted before as an intruder, standing near the couch. Currently he was sitting on the same couch, trying very hard to look slightly more dainty. How the hell did Josh fit in this feminine decor? He chuckled internally, pleased with the less-than-salutary conclusions that could be drawn from that thought..._oh goody, Mick. You're going to get petty about his masculinity now? How about that cosy corner in the kitchen where you vamped out and tried to kiss her. _Tried to because he stopped himself, not that Beth could have done anything to prevent him.

Beth came in carrying a cup of coffee and a huge muffin, probably about half the size of her face. _You should tell her that, that's a winning compliment._

She was frowning. "Why did you say that at the door?"

He was assiduously studying the painting of two ducks on the wall opposite. "Say what?"

There was a _chink _as she slammed the coffee down. "Bad liars, Mick. We've already been over this."

"You're cute when you're mad."

Beth was silent. She started nervously, "Mick, look, Josh and I..."

"It was a joke, Beth."

He was nervous and angry and it was making him vicious. Mick shifted slightly on the couch - this is like quicksand - and tried again, "There are some things I need to tell you." He stopped, startled by the sudden acceleration in her heartbeat. "Beth are you alright?"

She glared at him in frustration. "How many times are you going to start telling me about this case?"

"It's not really a case." He held up a hand to stall her, "The hospital called while I was in New York. They're not sure how it happened but...Coraline's disappeared."

Beth dropped half the muffin.

_OK, now it looks edible...not like a football with blueberries._

"Disappeared?" she echoed.

"Yes."

"How is that possible?"

This was the part Mick hated the most. He paused to force the words out, "They're not sure. She flatlined. When the nurses went to revive her a few seconds later, they found the bed empty."

She was silent while she processed it. "Oh my God. I killed her." _She's dead? She was dying and I didn't even go...didn't care to ask about...I stabbed a woman and then forgot she existed? I murdered her._

He moved quickly to the armchair. "No, Beth. You didn't. I think a vampire came to get her. I smelled vamp when I went into the room and the trail ends in an adjoining alley. I haven't had a chance to check it out properly yet, OK?"

"Are you sure?" she asked clasping her arms round herself tightly.

He frowned. I have no idea..."Yeah."

"But what happened to the body?" She kept her voice even. _I refuse to cry anymore, I will not cry!_

"When I said a vampire came to get her I meant it literally."

She was looking at him sympathetically. She was looking at him sympathetically!

"I'm so sorry, Mick. I know you still...cared about her."

He moved back to the couch. The distance between them seemed forced now, the natural comraderie stretched thin. Beth watched him, conscious of a sudden sense of wild fury. Surely Mick could face this conversation without running away! Was he that much of a coward? She stood up and moved to the couch, following pointedly. "What about the cure?" she asked bluntly.

He shifted again, discomforted by her nearness. "I have some blood."

Beth looked confused. "What blood?" He still wasn't looking at her. She glanced over at the ducks.

"I _took _some blood from her when I was last there."

"They gave you -"

"No. I took some blood. Hypodermic needle, found a vein, extracted, OK?" This was all wrong. There was nothing to tell her. He was just a fool, playing games to kill the time. This was nothing. He turned, half relieved, to her and stopped short. Oh Christ, this was not nothing.

"I should go," he said abruptly, getting to his feet slightly more awkwardly than usual. _Goddamned couch!_

She rose too. "Do you want me to help you find Coraline?"

"No," incredulously. "I just wanted to tell you so that you knew."

"And that's it, Mick? That's all you came to tell me?"

_Tell her, Mick. A woman deserves to know when she has your heart, now. Maybe it will be you that has hers, lad. _"No."

She looked hopeful.

"Josef called. He says 'thank you' specially." Neither of them was going to talk about it. _You are such a coward, St John. Tell her. What's the worst that could happen? Oh god, no, stop that thought! It was diabolical as one of Josef's parties. Spun all hell out of control...Tell her! _"About New York..." his voice trailed off. He was half-expecting to see her dismiss the words instantly. Half-hoping, actually.

She fixed him with her clear gaze.

"I'm sorry about what happened. With Martan. The killing. Seeing Sarah...everything." He ran a hand through his hair distractedly. He couldn't say the words. So he said he next best thing. "I'm glad you and Josh were able to work things out."

Beth looked away. She responded shakily a moment later, "I guess we've been drifting apart recently and we decided that we'd try properly this time."

Mick smiled. "Relationships are hard." _Especially with a wife like mine._

Evidently the same thought had occurred to Beth because she looked up at him and smiled and it was like walking into a blood bank running a two-for-one special. "Yeah, they are. Although Coraline and Josh are quite different." She giggled.

He nodded supercilliously. "Coraline's hotter."

Beth's face was a study. She looked half-shocked, half-amused, as if she couldn't

make up her mind. Finally she settled on poking him again. "She may be hotter but he can cook."

Mick raised an eyebrow. "Coraline's French. Did I never mention that she could cook? She just couldn't eat."

"No," Beth muttered, turning away slightly.

"So, no come back to that?" he quizzed lightly.

"Try _not_ kidnapping little children in the middle of the night to salvage a dead marriage," she retorted. Beth felt her fists clench and her cheeks grow hot.

"Hey." Mick took hold of her shoulders and looked at her with concern. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong. I'm fine. It just seems disrespectful."

He could smell her pain. "You're not fine," he said. And then he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close.

She flowed into him, holding on tight. No, she wasn't OK. She wasn't OK because as much as she felt for Josh, she felt something for Mick too. It killed her that even though Mick had carefully and politely put her aside every time, she couldn't give herself to Josh completely. It killed her that she caught herself wishing Mick was human...

He held her till he felt her muscles relax. Then he stepped out to arm's length quickly.

"Drink?" he asked smiling.

Beth nodded. "Stay here, I'll find it."

She finished three-quarters of a bottle of wine, he tossed down a quarter bottle of scotch. He said it was too sacrilegious to drink the way she was demolishing the wine. Josh called to say he was working late and would go back to his own apartment eventually. He'd see her tomorrow. It was a really big case!

That had really incensed Beth. "So, if he needs to vanish, then it's OK? I can't vanish. Oh no. _Especially _not with you," she said pointing at Mick.

He looked at the floor trying to hide the grin. "Beth, you're drunk. You should probably watch what you're saying."

She sighed. "I am a little drunk. But not that drunk."

"Oh good," he replied, "there's levels."

They both laughed. He told her about LA in the thirties, she listened avidly and asked questions. Eventually at 3 a.m he figured he should leave. Beth was dozing on the couch by then.

"Beth." He leaned over to touch her shoulder gently. "It's late, you should go to bed. I'm going to head home."

She groaned. "OK."

"Do you want me to get you anything?"

She groaned again. "Blankets, bed and water."

He chuckled. "I can get you blankets and water. I could bring the bed too but I'm not sure you want that."

"Water."

She sounded like a sulky child. She sounded adorable. "OK, water."

When she finished the glassful, she looked a lot better. "I suppose I should go to bed," she moaned, eyeing the distance to the bedroom.

He rolled his eyes. "Beth?" She turned to face him and he swept her up into his arms. She gasped and linked her arms round his neck. And suddenly he realised that it was a very long walk to the bedroom with her body shifting in his hands and her face inches away...

He laid her down on the bed carefully, one knee balancing their weight on the mattress. Beth opened her eyes and he saw that she wasn't drunk. Tired and worn out, but not drunk. And still holding on to him. "You need to let go," he said softly. She let go. He didn't move. She was lying on her back, staring up at him, and he watched the rise and fall of her chest.

_Tell her!_

"Mick." It was just a whisper. But it was enough.

He bent his head to hers, close enough that she could see what he was doing and stop him if she wanted. Oh, Christ. What was he doing? She didn't move. Then, he heard her heartbeat speed up and that was all the encouragement Mick needed.

He kissed her till she was raw with need, gasping against him. The iron control he'd had when she came to him high on Black Crystal had vanished. He couldn't find the words to tell her, but he could show her. "Do you want me to stay?" he asked huskily, his heart in his eyes. It was an aeon before she nodded, once, and then pulled him back down to her.


	15. Chapter 15

AN: Yes, this is an unorthodox scene; it's written in stream of consciousness. Forgive me for wanting a Molly Bloom moment. Take your time reading it.

--

He kissed her till she was raw with need, gasping against him. The iron control he'd had when she came to him high on Black Crystal had vanished. He couldn't find the words to tell her, but he could show her. "Do you want me to stay?" he asked huskily, his heart in his eyes. It was an aeon before she nodded, once, and then pulled him back down to her.

And he laid his hands on her and he laid his mouth on her. And her mind was twitching shifting moving with her body small animal grunts and she was thinking oh sweet god don't stop your hands eyes oh yes mouth I must have been mad to wait this long can you feel my heartbeat? yes more yes touch me please oh my lord he's teasing me I cry I moan I beg there is no shame in this wanting all I feel is unaccountable need and I want his love I want to taste him pulling his face to mine my hands in the curls stubble tickles my skin I can hear the bed creak and the sheets whisper and I can smell him enveloped in me and oh god he's leaving...further...that can't be his eyes like a white flame and even if I have had men before this is molten I am liquid moving under him gasping we're both gasping like drowning I can touch him he's shucked the clothes I was angry at being naked first but if he had been naked I would have exploded when he felt me -

in the background she can hear his breathing labour feel his body tremble against hers and he is whispering beth beth beth oh god the smell of her intoxicating the feel of her like a warm bubbling fountain I am drowning looking up at the ceiling I can feel her stroking grasping sweet mary mother of god I think I am going to die from her touch I am counting 1-2-28-49 in my head like a muddled up child I cannot look I can only smell her my head is fixed with the memory and I put my hands on her again so I can trace the patterns of her bones I want to draw her curves with my fingertips I want to taste everywhere your blood your sweat pooling round your neck the liquid gathered in your thighs the tantalising corners of your mouth if I flick at with my tongue she moans and it is the single most beautiful thing I have ever heard oh god I must be mad I must have her now Beth is forcing her mouth to mine pulling me from her breast I can taste the wine like a sickness swirl my tongue to absorb every flavour can she feel me pressed against her and -

stormy eyes when I open mine he makes me ache and not touching -

I want to bury my face in her curves and drink every last drop of moisture from her skin her nipples are so taut I am frozen when I taste them blood pumping pooling under the surface aglow like red candles she can feel my fangs and she's crying out my name please let me not hurt her I must move - slick oh sweet jesus I'm going to come she's so wet woman if I had to wait a hundred years for you oh fuck and her hips are thrashing up to meet my lips my fingers are tugging and teasing and she is crying -

I am not worthy I am not worthy sweet-

but all she notices is that his face is buried inside her and his tongue is stroking her and she is cresting riding thrashing in agony sweet Mick torture and it has never been like this before no never no man has ever touched her like a treasure his hands are shaking as they move into her I can feel fangs as his mouth moves high I can ah Mick ah I am - this - must - escape - evolve - explode - I am shifting shapes the boundaries of my body blurring and I am falling into him and he is devouring me and I oh I ah can't ah so now he knows she is close and his body begins to scream for more -

the taste the texture if he lives till the end of time when the sun explodes and burns him to dust all he will want to remember was how she called and how she moved and how she loved and my body is betraying me the beast the monster must be fed I cannot stop now I cannot stay here please lord don't let me hurt her or I will die I think I love her as much as I am able but the blood is calling and I move towards her head thrashing on the pillow she's whimpering yesyesyes and i feel like eternal time has stopped there is only now but she pulls me back to reality when she squeezes my fingers inside and I know she is close and I know I must be there with her I must know her in every way possible and my head is sinking towards the swell of one breast down the valley between up the curve to the promised tip and I set my fangs and pierce and she explodes inside my mouth and around my hands and she is under me tangled masses of limbs I am taking in the glory of God in her veins and she is whispering yes oh god yes we are both feeding off each other and I feel her above me the loose strands of hair hitting my face as she flails and then I must stop and I lay my head upon her chest and I close my eyes and vanish back into the blood memories in my mouth and she is everywhere around me and inside me she has stained me and I will never get her out beloved...


	16. Chapter 16

Update Note: Sorry about the long wait for this update. Hydriotaphia has gone on holiday and asked me to upload the chapters for her. Unfortunately, the annoying prevalence of Real Life and my ignorance about her computer system has delayed me more than I thought it would. I feel very ashamed and I do apologize for it.

---------------------------------------------

Guillermo stared after Mick.

St John was uptight, but this was way beyond that. He radiated unleashed frustration. That man was going to explode if he wasn't careful. Guillermo knew better than to mention it of course. Mick was...different. Besides, who wanted to mess with the renegade who spent most of his time fighting his own kind?

He dipped two fingers quickly into the cup of O+ and then into his mouth. Tart. Smooth. Comforting!

--

_Beloved_...

He cradled his head against her, listening to their pounding heartbeats and gasping breaths. Every sense was tingling and heightened; he could smell the sex in the air, feel the slow exhaustion taking his body over, her blood lingered on his tongue. Feeding from her had been so intimate and overwhelming, the orgasm virtually wrenched from him as he drowned in the sensations. When he felt her breathing start to slow down, Mick shifted himself off her and gently pulled her into his arms. She slid easily against him; her muscles lax with euphoria, each breath deeper than the last.

Beth opened her eyes and gave him a small, sleepy smile. "Oh my God," she whispered reverently against his chest.

She heard the laughter rumble beneath her temple and pushed closer against his side, draping over him possessively. Heavy lids fought with confusion and tenderness. She needed to talk to him, to ask him the hundreds of questions floating in her head now.

"Ssshh," he said, running a hand down her back. _She's exhausted...._ "Sleep now."

"Mick." She sighed his name again and he felt her head slip into the crook of his arm. It was going to be painful to hold it there indefinitely, but from this position he could see her face perfectly. Sixty years is a long time to deny yourself, but he would do it again in a heartbeat for this moment. The thought was so emphatic that Mick promptly laughed at himself, _When did I become such a hopeless romantic?_

"No, Mick..." She forced her eyelids open briefly.

"Yes?" His heart stopped. No, what?

"Stay."

_Heart OK again. Heart more than OK again!_ He leaned over and kissed her briefly, felt her smile at the contact. "Of course." _Lovesick_...

He stared at her as she slept, noting that she breathed through her nose with a tiny snuffle. She didn't shift around, didn't talk in her sleep, she looked even younger with her face relaxed and her hair tousled. _Get a grip, St John. _He sent a silent 'Thank you' to the universe.

Eventually his arm started to throb and he carefully shifted her head to his shoulder. Outside the street was quiet, porch lights beaming in the warm darkness. Her heart beat once for every two sharp clicks from the alarm clock by him. _I can't hold her for long. The sun's coming up._ And he tightened his grip on her, willing time to slow down so he could relish this moment.

In repose she had dark circles under her eyes, as if she hadn't had a full night's sleep in a while. Made sense given the plane trip and her work, then last night she certainly hadn't had much sleep. And the night before last....

Mick froze. He knew very well what Beth had been doing two nights ago and the knowledge almost made him gag. He closed his eyes briefly, trying to fight the urge to wake her up and demand answers. What did it mean that she'd asked him to stay with her? Did she feel the same way? What the hell had he been thinking?

_Did I take advantage of her? She wasn't drunk. She wasn't drunk! Please God...don't take this from me. I need to hear her say that she wants me. I have to talk to her when she wakes up. Tell her that I never meant for this to happen, that I fought this, but I want her. I want her. She's mine! She's been mine since she was four._

_Another, more violent part of his brain was screaming, Don't be stupid, St John. She just had sex with her human boyfriend two nights ago. I smelled it on her. It's not over for them. She's playing you both._

_No. Beth would never play that game._

_She didn't have a choice. She wants you, but maybe she doesn't want to be with you._

_What did we do?! - Tell her!_

_That's ridiculous. I can't be that vulnerable. Not with Josh still there. I need to know he's not the one for her before I let her close again. I can't take another betrayal._

_Beth would never betray me._

_(I'll love you forever!)_

_(Mick, look, Josh and I-)_

_(I've given you a gift.)_

_(...we've decided to try properly this time..)_

Once Josh was out of the way, he could tell Beth everything that was overflowing inside him. Mortal emotions. Second chances. Love? But Josh needed to be out of the picture._ I should tell her now so that she knows how much I want her, but the last time she had to choose, it wasn't me._

He hadn't realised he was crying till a tear rolled down his cheek. The vampire inside was laughing hysterically - _Fucking hell, stop being so pathetic! You've survived decades without her. She's food, you've eaten, you've marked her. She wants you, you can smell it from across the room. She just gave herself to you! We've played games with her to lead her on. You can survive one night in limbo...._

Mick tamped down on that line of thought hard. _I've trusted her with terrible things and she has never let me down._

Only a little while to sunrise.

When Beth finally opened her eyes again, the first thing she was able to focus on was the ceiling, a long wedge of light filtered through the blinds, the shadows dancing around it. The next thing she was aware of was the brush of lips against her collarbone, the act sending a heavy flush all across her body and a tingle down her spine.

It took all of two seconds for her to realise what was wrong with the picture. He felt different curving against her, he smelled different, that mixture of clean skin and masculinity...and her response to him was utterly and overwhelmingly different.

Beth swallowed. _Oh God, Josh. Oh God. No. She hadn't. She had. She..._

"Mick," she breathed, watching him raise his head to look at her. She inhaled sharply; he was, without doubt, the most beautiful man she had ever seen...

He had a tentative half-smile on his lips as though he was unsure of what to do next. Her heart rate had sped up rapidly and he found had no idea what to say to her first.

"Hey," he murmured huskily, raising himself slightly to look down at her. "You all right?"

He watched the flush fade from her neck and the frown begin between her eyebrows. _Oh no._

"Beth," he said, drawing himself up so he could look into her eyes. Big mistake...he could feel her skin slide against his as he moved. And he was so close to - Jesus....From the look on her face, she felt it too.

"Wait." Gasping.

He gritted his teeth and then suddenly he was jerking away, his jaw clenched.. "Not going to..."

Beth sat up swiftly, the brightness catching her sharply in the eyes. Sunlight! Daylight. And he was still here. _Do I ask what this means? That's a stupid question, I know what it means! It means I cheated on Josh. Why now? Why did he come to me now? _She raised accusing eyes to him, "Why?"

The single word shattered the tenuous memories of skin on skin linking them.

His eyes went icy but he made no attempt to answer her question. Instead he rolled away from her and before she could say anything he had most of his clothes back on.

_Bastard! Running again. _"Why?" she repeated louder.

"What do you want me to say to you, Beth?" he rounded on her, shirt in hand.

She went quiet and he could see the guilt pinch her features. "I don't know. I asked you to stay...afterwards. But I -...Why now, Mick? Why did you kiss me now?"

"You could have stopped me," he pointed out quietly.

"I told you that Josh and I were going to try."

"You weren't exactly coerced!"

She reared away from him as if he'd slapped her. "No!" Her voice was barely over a whisper. "I never meant to imply that." She paused as if summoning courage. "What does this mean?"

_I got it wrong after all._

_Sam's voice: You slept with Linda? My wife?! But you're my best friend. You're like my brother. You live with me. Look at you, you can have any woman you want. You couldn't leave just one alone? You couldn't leave MINE alone?_

_This is nothing like that. I think I love her._

Mick caught his breath as she sat up at the edge of the bed, the filtered light outlining her. Jesus God, she was beautiful. _Get out of here!_ "Are you going to tell him?"

She turned back to face him and he blanched at her words, "What if I did? What would be the point of that?"

She watched his face transform. The serious, stern look disappeared and in it's place was so much hurt she felt her heart contract. Then his features evened out again. "I can't say more than I'm sorry. Let's just forget it, OK? You were drunk and..."

"No! Mick, stop it. You know I wasn't. Please tell me."

"So, what do you want me to say, huh? Sorry but I didn't mean to screw things up with you and Josh?"

Silence.

"It's my fault too," she responded blandly.

"Are you still going to try?"

She didn't reply for a second. _I don't know. I don't know._ "Do I have a choice?" _Tell me if I have a choice! How can I do this to Josh?_

Choice made. He turned to leave.

"Wait!"

She had the bed sheet bunched up around her. Right. Because he hadn't memorised the way she looked. His brain was in a whirl, it's only demand was for him to get the hell out before he lost it. "Talk." The monosyllable had an edge she'd never heard in his voice before.

Mick watched her struggle with the words. Clearly, this is not going the way she expected. What had she expected? _She doesn't get to break the guards down, leave, and then come back for a second round. Does she think I'm that stupid? No, just that lovesick_. The words made him angrier still.

"You know that I was a willing participant too." Beth looked up at him, clearly expecting some sort of response.

He took a perverse pleasure in schooling his features so that only a polite interest showed. He had no intention of letting things get out of hand again. He couldn't afford for that to happen, he lost it embarrassingly quickly around her.

_OK, so he's not going to make this easy. _"I know that I have a boyfriend, one that I suppose I love. And I can't - can't end up like Sarah."

His eyes glittered, "I must've missed something, Beth. At which point exactly did I say I would turn you?"

"You know you didn't. But as crazy as this sounds, I know we've both been thinking about it."

He started to speak but she cut him off quickly, "Don't you dare deny it!"

"I'd say it's a good thing your boyfriend is human." That hit a nerve. Good. What the hell was she playing at? He'd seen Josh in the apartment. She wasn't going to play the both of them...

You don't want to do this," he asserted quietly.

_He doesn't want what I thought - maybe -...I'm just embarrassing him now._ Beth nodded after a minute. "I'm sorry too. It's no-one's fault...Mick?"

He looked at her questioningly.

"I know this is awkward." She swallowed tightly, "But...I can't lose my guardian angel."

Did she know how that twisted the knife? He looked at the floor and his eyes flashed. "Beth," he said and twenty-two years of iron control steadied his voice, "I'm not going anywhere. I just think we should give it a few days."

"Oh, OK."

He left without another word.

--

_Give it a few days._ Mick braced his arms against the balcony and his head drooped. Out in the street he heard the sounds of singing - a young couple were walking arm-in-arm. _They couldn't be more than nineteen_, he thought wistfully, when the world is fresh and beckoning._ I can't give her who I am, all the broken memories, the distance between past and future. It's for the best. I just can't help wanting to tell her._ The boys jeans were ripped at the knees, he brandished the tattoo round his wrist proudly, pulling his partner's arm through his. Mick watched her toss her hair, the cold air fogging their eyes for everything but each other. He remembered that feeling.

The glass he had been holding shattered against the far wall; blood trickled down in thick rivulets. He watched the stain drip impassively. Tonight it wasn't going to satisfy him.


	17. Chapter 17

The couple sitting across the table were obviously middle-class and very, very scared. Of the varieties laid before him over the years, the cases that Mick persevered with the most and enjoyed the least involved missing children. Perhaps a lot of his empathy stemmed from the fact that he had lost all opportunity to have any more children of his own. At least any that he could acknowledge.

Calvin Willard was due to appear in a juvenile court on criminal charges of theft from his local Walgreens. He and two friends were caught trying to lift over $500 worth of over-the-counter cold and cough medications while stoned out of their adolescent skulls.

Mick held his discomfort in check as the parents slowly, and painstakingly, ran through their version of the case. It was physically agonising sometimes to witness the self-destructive tactics of human teenagers. They didn't seem to realise just how much there was to live for or what it was that they were squandering.

"...the hearing is on the 14th and we can't find him anywhere. We've called all his friends, we've called all the hospitals every day, Helene has tried leaving food out on the back-porch overnight in case he was hiding nearby but the dogs broke in so we had to stop." Joe Willard did all the talking. Nice enough, big guy, Mick figured he had probably played varsity football. The wife let him do all the talking - unusual.

Mick looked at them carefully. "I need to ask you this," he said, keeping his voice professional, "I'm a long way from Inglewood and my work's not cheap. Why do you want to hire me exactly?"

He watched the flush spread across the husband's face but Joe said nothing. Mrs. Willard was the first to break the silence, "It was my decision." She reached into her leather handbag nad then handed over a piece of much-folded paper.

Mick opened it to see his face staring back at him. Both articles were from The LA Times; the first ran a paparazzi shot of him exiting the police station with Lt. Davis. The headline above screamed - _Exonerated PI ends Spaulding death spree_! The other featured a picture of Leni. After the trial she had publicly thanked Mick, a move that had half the city's beaurocracies scrambling to meet with him for PR purposes. He'd chosen to hide from everyone, Beth included, for about a week till the fuss died down.

Helene Willard's soft voice cut in again, "You do whatever it takes to find someone and keep them safe. Especially people in highly dangerous situations, going up against...a- a gang, maybe." She and her husband exchanged uneasy glances.

Mick sat up a bit straighter. _Finally_!

"I think we'd better start over," he said, taking charge now that he'd gotten his answer. "I am going to ask some questions and I hope you will give me as much information as possible."

They both nodded, eyes downcast like naughty schoolchildren. Despair and Desperation - it was as if their subdued demeanours coupled with the anguished slumping of their bodies turned them into matching, polished statues.

"Why was he stealing?" It was a hard question, and one he wouldn't normally have asked so abruptly. But damned if he wasn't going to find out just who he'd be going up against.

"We didn't know at first," Joe started, "Cal was a good kid."

Mick's eyes narrowed. _Every parent says that. The unibomber had a mother, for Christ's sake._

"You don't believe us." Helene Willard stood up abruptly. "You think he's just some punk kid from a gang neighbourhood who got greedy and stupid? You're sitting here, listening to us tears our hearts apart talking to you and you don't even care enough not to judge us!" She was almost wailing, her words loud enough to be heard down the hallway.

The husband stood up to pat her ineffectually, "Honey, honey. He hasn't said that." He looked at Mick, "I think maybe we're wasting your time. We want someone to do something close to impossible. We want you to find Cal and make sure nobody follows you to him, but if you don't think he's worth it maybe you won't try so hard."

Mick stood up as well, completing the tableaux. _Way to go, St John. Get your mind back onto the job and get the fuck out of this mess! _When he spoke, his voice was still professional but tinged with deep regret. When you sing, you have to know how to sell the emotions.

"Please believe me when I say I have no intention of judging Calvin's or your behaviour until I hear the details. From the little I've heard it sounds more like he's in over his head than just playing by gang rules." No shit, Sherlock, the kid's fourteen. What the hell is a fourteen-year old doing in a gang? Shouldn't he be learning to skateboard or something?

He gestured politely to the chair behind the wife. "Mrs. Willard, I promise that I'll do everything in my power to help find your son. Please won't you sit down and tell me about it?"

Joe stared at him bug-eyed but Helene sank down slowly. The two men resumed their seats. She was the first to speak, "Quite a sudden decision you made there, to take our case without having all your questions answered." _Suspicious and honest, good._

He smiled at her, "Good parents don't often raise bad kids. Your son will have his reasons, I'm sure. And I didn't ask the questions to help me decide. I need to know what he's running from." St John charm - 1, tactlessness - 0.

Mr. Willard interrupted, "Do you do a lot of missing children's cases?"

"Enough. Too many." Both answers were true.

"You have a soft spot for missing children?" _Ah, suspicious and honest __**and **__perceptive._

He nodded.

"Good." She sat back satisfied.

Her husband glanced uneasily at her and when she nodded began to answer Mick's question again. "We're not sure why Cal began stealing. After he was arrested, they sent him to a shrink. They found something off about his answers and did some testing. Apparently Cal has an above average IQ. We always knew he was smart. I mean, Helene is so bright and she says Cal was walking and talking well before the normal age for babies. He just never seemed to fit in at school."

"Cal looks like me," he continued proudly, "a big guy. Star quarter-back material, y'know? But, Inglewood's gotten hard. We moved there from Compton in the '80s to get away from the gangs. It was great, we knew all our neighbours. We were really happy. Cal was a late baby and by '93 Inglewood had changed. The gangs started to take over, just like Compton, but where were we gonna move now, y'know? The housing prices are rising, the market's tight and incomes, well, they're still what they used to be. We still got our mortgage." He fiddled with the plain gold wedding band around his finger. "Cal didn't fit in cos he was bright and he didn't want nothing to do with gangs. He wanted to be a sailor - join the Navy, see the world. And he hated fighting, he'd never even learn how to box. He said if non-violence was good enough for Martin Luther King and Gandhi, it was good enough for him." Joe laughed shortly, a cracked and broken sound, "He was ten and telling me this. I'm almost 50 and I didn't know who Gandhi was before."

Mrs. Willard was staring at her clasped hands, eyes fixed and wide.

Mick took a deep breath. He needed to move the conversation or the smell of their pain was likely to drive him mad as well - "What happened?"

"He got picked on," the mother snapped. "He was a tall boy who wouldn't use his size to bully anyone so they bullied him. Head stuffed in toilet, slammed into lockers, verbal taunting, egged the house once." Her voice grew bitter and harsh with unshed tears. "I told him to ignore them, that it would stop. It didn't. I saw cigarette burns on his back once. They...they..." She had to take a deep breath before continuing, "They ganged up on him in the showers, called him a fag and when he tried to explain, they..."

"I understand," Mick interrupted quickly. He was fighting to keep control of his emotions -_ I am far too much of an emotional wild-card at the moment - _the anger he felt churning in his stomach was eroding his vamp control. "So, he told you this? Did he tell anyone else?"

Joe shook his head, "He didn't tell us. He wouldn't tell us at the time. Saw it in the shrink's report. He stopped telling us anything when he turned twelve. You don't know what it's like, growing up black and smart and watching your own community turn on you."

"When did he join a gang?"

"He didn't."

Mick's eyes narrowed again. "I thought..."

"It wasn't like that. He wouldn't have been welcomed by the black gangs. He started hanging with some of the Latino kids. They formed these 'theft crews' to lift the meds for gangs. Cal didn't join the gang, he just tagged along on the raids. But it was a bit of protection for him. Nobody touched him after that. The more they stole, the more they were rewarded. They got marijuana as payment. By the time Cal turned fourteen he was stoned almost every day. We didn't know what to do, we didn't know where it was coming from."

"So, then he got caught?"

Two heads nodded in sync. Joe Willard explained, "It was his first offence. After a couple meetings with the shrink Cal promised he'd never do it again. We got him out on bail, the house is up as collateral. He would never let them take it for no reason. Then the cops showed up one day and wanted to talk to him. We said no, not without a lawyer. Calvin was gone that night."

_Damn_! Mick finally understood._ There's no other reason the overworked men on Inglewood PD would want to go chasing juvies._ "What did the cops want?"

"Apparently to talk about who organised the crews, who they reported to. They offered witness protection. Cal said he couldn't talk."

"Which gang?"

"We don't know."

--

After they left, he stared out the window at the skyline, trying not to focus on the words flying round his mind. The city looked so peaceful from here, beautiful even. If you just scanned the headlines every day, you might be forgiven for thinking that the wars were all far away. He didn't know a lot about gangs but he understood gang mindsets very well. Becoming a 'non-traditional' vampire had taken more strength and willpower than he ever thought possible. Nobody had understood, the others had certainly not approved and on more than one occasion he'd found himself lapsing, unable to countenance the stares, the whispers, the palpable disapproval from his community. Beth, the memory of Beth stayed with him till he'd finally kicked the habit...but he'd been sixty-three going in to it. And nobody had ever laid a hand on him for it.

_Beth_.

Jaw clenched, he mused on what chance a fourteen-year old might have to withstand the pressure.

Inglewood tomorrow. Good, he needed something to pour his energy into; with a different target for his anger, he might just get back to normal. An angry vampire is a dangerous entity, if he snapped people would get hurt, lots of people and badly.


	18. Chapter 18

He drove measuredly, the frustrations of the past few days still clawing at him. He couldn't sleep, wasn't eating properly and the burgeoning desire to feed again from living flesh was taking a huge, emotional toll on his reserves of will-power. But if he was running on sheer will-power, Mick hid it well.

_PI rule number 4: When a person goes missing, the most prudent places to start looking for them is where they were last seen and where they were supposed to be. In Calvin's case, his bedroom and school. So, bedroom first and then school._

Inglewood was one of those places in LA that Mick had just never ventured to.

It was a nice, suburban house. Quiet street, flowers, smelled of cooking. He'd driven through some rough parts to get here though. Gang graffiti on a wall occasionally, fourteen year olds in tight shirts standing listlessly on street corners. Not a good move to be driving a vintage Mercedes. But the way he was feeling, he'd almost welcome a fight. The sleek car was out of place on the street, SUVs and family vans seemed to be the preferred modes of transportation. It looked safe and pristine, like something out of a Hallmark movie. He saw a curtain twitch across the street as he stepped out of the car, head down to avoid the sun.

A movement glimpsed out of the corner of his eye - _What the hell?_ He slowed down, stopped to inspect the brass street number plate carefully, and listened.

_Two men, hushed voices. Is that a CB radio?_

_"Guy just drove up. White, early 30s, license no. _____. Run it, OK? Hey, you getting all this? What the fuck is he doing? Looking at the street number?"  
"Yeah, yeah, I got it. Don't look gang but might be receiver. Not that dumb ass lawyer they got."_

The radio crackled, static obscuring the words. Anger surged again; Mick closed his eyes and inhaled. _Sunlight, humans, no sleep - I can't lose it now. _Control re-established he turned swiftly and sauntered across the street to the car. Looking left and right as you cross the road doesn't matter if you're one of only three people around...

As he approached he could hear the heartbeats quickening, one of them snapping open the glove box for something. They sat straighter and leaned into each other for a moment, heads bent at an odd angle. Then the driver turned and watched him steadily as he strode up to the window. Mick gestured for him to lower it and almost grinned when he saw their cover. A map and a bag of trail mix sat in plain sight. He half-expected to see Hollywood souvenirs in the back seat.

"Kinda outta the way for Disneyland, isn't it?" Mick asked, resting a hand on the roof. This earned him two filthy scowls. He tried again. "OK, officers, I'll ask nicely. What are you doing here?"

They moved together like dancers. Mick was ready for the driver who had to open his door to do anything but the guy from the passenger side moved much faster than he'd been expecting. _Not cops!_ He backed off anyway, hands raised, watching them.

The driver hadn't pulled his gun yet, figures.

"DEA, get over here, hands on the roof."

He went willingly enough, the car was in the shade.

"Pat him down." Driver to Passenger. All about control, the one in charge almost always drove too.

"I'm a PI. My name is Mick St John. The Willards hired me to find Calvin." There was no point lying, they had his license plate running through the DMV. Right on cue the CB crackled. Driver went to listen in, while a very nervous looking Passenger covered him. Mick looked at the guy, slightly concerned, _What does he have to be so nervous about?_

Driver came back. Not smiling, but then not trying to club him over the head with anything either. Mick sighed. It was hot and he needed to get indoors.

"PI registration and driver's licence."

_No 'please'?_ He handed over his PI credentials.

"Driver's license." That was an order.

Mick didn't feel much like orders today. He didn't feel much like anything today, except finding a fourteen-year old and then going to sleep, out of the goddamned sun. "When you pull me over for speeding, I'll give you my license."

He blocked the shove before Driver even knew he'd been leaning forward. "You don't want to do this." _I seem to be saying that a lot to humans lately._ "You're under cover, OK. Not gonna mess with your investigation. I just need to know if you're staking out Calvin Willard's house and if so, why. All I've been hired to do is find him." Apparently the St John charm didn't work so well with human males because Passenger lost it.

"Listen to me, you slick bastard." The gun was raised just slightly from the position it had been in before. "We don't have to tell you shit. You come with us and explain what you're doing and why. You just compromised an investigation."

Mick folded his arms across his chest. This was taking too long, what the hell was he thinking? He should've just walked away and ignored them. "No, client confidentiality. But if you know where a fourteen-year old is hiding and you're keeping that from his parents, I'll have the media down here so fast it'll make your head spin." _Beth, you mean Beth._ For a split second, he found himself half-praying they'd call his bluff so he could make the call and just hear her voice again.

Trading threats with law enforcement is never a good idea. Much later, Mick would think back and shudder at the enormity of his stupidity. The universe, at least, seemed to be on his side today. Mrs Willard was walking down her front path and towards them.

"Mr St John?" her clear voice carried well, effectively stopping Passenger's diatribe. "Is everything all right?"

"Mrs Willard," he said, merely nodding at her. There was something regal about the woman that discouraged a casual touch.

The two men stepped away and got back in the car.

Mick moved towards her as they pulled out behind him. "We should go indoors."

_Only in LA would we have a stinking heat wave in winter_, he mused sourly as she brought him iced water. _Hmm...two sips should do it._

"What happened?" she asked a touch breathlessly. "I heard you drive up and then nothing! And then the neighbour across the street called to say that two men were patting you down?"

_Damn_..._what had he been thinking_? "They were law enforcement. I needed to see if there was anything they could tell me." Short and sweet.

"And was there?" A touch desperately.

"No." A lie, but telling someone the DEA is watching them without knowing much about the situation - not the brightest thing to do. He'd done enough stupid things today. "They're waiting for Calvin too." He hadn't intended to say that, but the woman reminded him of Sister Celia, the Sunday School dragon...he found himself confessing things automatically.

There was a large studio portrait of Calvin on the table near Mick. He studied it carefully, noting that it must have been taken a few years ago, the boy in this picture looked happy, well-adjusted and innocent. He did take after his father. After you come to terms with the fact that you are, to all extents and purposes, an ancient spirit in a youthful body, you stop seeing the body as an indication of age. Mick could see age and experience in someone's eyes, in the ways they carried themselves, the smell of their bodies. This happy kid had to have been about ten. Talking about peace and resistance, and concepts so large that thousands of men much older than he had been crushed under them.

"I'm going to take a look at Calvin's room, if that's OK?" he asked, desperate to get back on track.

She nodded. "The cops came over when he went missing and they searched too. There were some drugs in the closet, marijuana I think, they took that. And his laptop."

_Damn!_ "Anything else they took?"

She shook her head.

Calvin was an enigma. Why was the DEA trying to track down a child? More importantly, what did they think he knew?

Preliminary searches revealed absolutely...not much. Sniffing the stale air had brought a few vivid images of Calvin, hooded sweatshirt covering his head leaning out the window and getting high. Adolescent pain, rage after his parents had tried to reason with him again, embarrassment over who he was, desire as he masturbated to posters on his wall - Halle Berry, Jessica Alba. _Fourteen_, Mick reminded himself. _When I was fourteen if I'd had a poster of a half-naked woman on my wall my mother would've tried to exorcise me herself._ Homework, Calvin sat down with it every night but he never turned it in. Not cool to turn in homework. Not macho.

Mick walked tentatively to the bed. Blood was the best way to link to the past. Vampires read blood like cryptic words. Any bodily contact that left secretions could help though. Adolescent boy, bodily secretions; he groaned. _I really don't need to see that._

When he inhaled he was momentarily stunned by the images. Tears, the whole bed was awash in pain and fear and anger. Calvin was packing a bag, voices downstairs frightening him, talking about witness protection. He went out the window. _Shit!_ Mick leaned over the windowsill and tried to catch any traces he could. Nothing, cold trail. So he did run from the DEA.

He went to work methodically around the room. He found old Playboy issues under the mattress, a box full of trophies - Calvin had apparently been part of the gifted Science program and the debate team in junior high - and an extensive collection of sneakers. Mick eyed the desk covered in papers, dusty books, unopened textbooks. In the first drawer hidden in an old folder labelled 'Math notes' (yeah, right!), a few notes from some girl named Cassie. Girlfriend maybe? She didn't sound like the Willard's type of girl. The papers were torn out of a school book and full of typos and netspeak. He started to read and then stopped abruptly. _Jesus!_

_Dear Calvin,  
I missed you last nite!!! No1 nos about us I sware! Pleese come n see me soon I have to tell u sumthing_

The next note was no better:

_God baby I mis you wen ur not with me  
I no the rents r assholes but u gotta do this rite For me_

He went downstairs. Helene was still waiting. She raised a white face to him. Mick nodded, "I need to speak to some of his friends and see his school locker." Helene stood up quickly, hands clasped together.

--

"Two suspected members of the Hermanos Muerte brotherhood were killed in a shoot-out with the LAPD and DEA officers this afternoon, while six others were arrested after police stormed the safe house. Earlier today, the DEA received an anonymous tip that claimed HEM were moving to attack on rival gang LA 18. Two SWAT teams were sent to secure the two-storied townhouse in Hollywood behind me. Police are still cataloguing the various items seized during the raid including the gang's trademark machetes, sniper rifles and other high powered weaponry like AK-47's. According to the DEA, the gangs main source of income is narcotics and arms, both of which were found in large quantities. No specifics have been released as yet, but sources say that around $2 million dollars worth of cocaine was found in a make-shift lab in the basement.

The FBI's latest bulletin lists HEM as the most dangerous gang in the world. It is estimated that about 2,000 members of the brotherhood live in Los Angeles today. The gang has stayed in the headlines recently with well-publicised stand-offs with police in Houston and Maryland earlier this year. Deportation of gang members has not worked to reduce the numbers; instead immigrants from impoverished and war-torn nations such as El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Ecuador and Mexico are flocking to this symbol of Latin American culture. Many arrive with previous paramilitary training and guerilla experience, which is then used to preserve HEM's status as one of the most blood-thirsty and extreme groups of mercenaries available. The city has seen a heavy increase gang-related violence in the last 12 months, a worrying trend for both law enforcement and the citizens who live and work in these troubled times.

This is Beth Turner for BuzzWire."

Beth motioned to Steve to follow her as she walked over to where Carl was standing, watching the operation wind down.

"Carl, you have to give me something!"

He turned around, rolling his eyes, "Look, it's not my call. Most of these guys are DEA, you know that, Beth. They don't let us play in the big leagues, we're just the PD."

"Can I quote you on that?"

"And lose my job? No thanks!"

Beth had never seen Carl this frustrated before. "So, what now? What happens to them?"

"We waste more money trying 'em and sending 'em home. Two months, they'll recruit another ten people and then everyone gets shipped over here through Mexico. Excuse me, Beth." He walked away from her turning around only in panic to remind her, "Don't print that!"

Beth laughed. "OK, OK."

Once he had vanished into the crowd, she looked at Steve and raised her eyebrows. He nodded back smugly. Oh yeah, they were definitely going to run with that angle.

LA gangs had never been something Beth paid attention to. She'd always felt safe in LA. _I mean, who walked? You got in your car, you drove where you needed to be and that was it._ Even the more dangerous cases she worked, she'd been safe because she'd had Mick with her. Beth promptly slammed the door down on that line of thinking.

Steve glanced at her in concern. She'd been fine most of the morning and then she'd suddenly gone quiet around lunchtime. It was only when they'd gotten to the crime scene that he saw the sparkle in her eyes again. And now that listless, introspective mask was back.

"Hey," he said smiling, "you think Maureen is going to give you a hard time for not covering Britney's latest meltdown?" She didn't respond. "Beth?" Steve called louder, waving his hands for emphasis, "yoo hoo, earth to Beth!"

She jumped, startled, and swore.

_That is not like Beth...._

"Sorry, sorry Steve. Just...got a lot on my mind right now."

"You wanna share?"

She half-smiled. He was a good guy. "Not really. It's...complicated."

"I take it that means it's about _lurve_."

"Does anyone out of junior high use that word?"

"You're changing the subject."

"No, I'm not and I still don't want to talk about it. Hey, how do we get some more info on this gang?"

"Um, you're dating an Assistant DA..." Steve looked at her strangely.

She laughed. "No, I mean on the ground stuff. Interviews, footage, you know."

Steve pulled into Buzzwire and cut the engine before he turned to face her. "Are you crazy? This is not a nice gang. It's not safe, Beth."

"I'm a reporter, it's my job..."

"Yeah, and you won't be much of a reporter if you're dead now, will you?"

"Look, ask Josh," he continued. "Ask that PI friend of yours as well, he may know something. PIs always know something."

She stiffened perceptibly. "Not this time. Not his style. I'll check with Josh. Thanks, Steve."

He watched her walk away.


	19. Chapter 19

AN: Sorry for the delay. I'm back home and chapters shall be uploaded faster now. Thanks to everyone that read and reviewed!

--

It looked like the cops had cleared the locker out because there wasn't so much as a stray dime left in the corners.

Mick shook his head in frustration, trying to keep his mind clear. He was wasting time here. What he really needed to do was get a hold of the gang or the kids that Calvin had gone stealing with and beat the information out of them. The vampire inside snarled; the smell of children's blood filled the hallways, reminding him just how hungry he really was.

It was a good thing Josef was out of town. He would not have been happy, no matter how disposed he was towards Mick and Beth's strange relationship. And if he got even an inkling that Mick wasn't sleeping and wasn't eating, Mick knew that Josef would have him carted away and force-fed till he cracked. _That's the way it should be. I need to get out of here..._

He knew it was stupid, he knew he was being stupid. But this was just some small reminder, a self-flagellation for losing control, for taking something that wasn't his. He wanted to pine, cry, beat his fists against someone but that wasn't who Mick St John was. So he mourned like an adolescent in the throes of first heartbreak. Except the pain was keener because he knew from experience that the past fifty years had held nothing like Beth and the prospect of eternity without her or someone like her made his stomach heave.

The principal stood impatiently beside him; he was sick of it all. The cops crawling through the place, the arrests in the playground, the gun searches, the drug stashes, the rape, the gangs, the threats, the pregnancies, the waste, the filthy cycle of oppression -

"There's nothing here, Mr. St John. The police took everything."

Mick glanced at him, eyebrows creased into a frown, "Yeah, I can see that.

"Then perhaps this is all we can do for you?"

The school authorities had not been happy to see him. The cops had poked and prodded at an already explosive situation, and now he had shown up during school hours as an independent agent to run them through the same rigmaroles. It was a long shot but one Mick was willing to take.

"I need to find a fourteen-year old boy who's been missing for four days." He put all his fury and guilt into the sharp words. "The chances of tracing anyone plummet after the first 24 hours. I need to speak to his friends."

The principal was almost swayed. Almost. There was a brief pause where duty fought with concern and duty won. "I'm sorry, you know that's impossible. I can't allow it without parental or guardian's consent. The police have already asked and they disclaimed all knowledge."

Mick looked up thoughtfully. "He's fourteen - they know where he is. And how do I explain to the Willards that their son is still missing because we can't ask his friends for that information again?" It wasn't a fight he was going to win, but he felt just perverse enough to want to make the point.

Dinsk flushed. "I know," he said and there was almost regret in his voice. "But it's a legal requirement. If there's anything else?"

"No, thank you."

Mick was escorted politely to the front door. It had taken all of twenty-five minutes to work out that the school was more relieved than anything else to have a few less troublemakers around. And to learn that there was no concrete evidence he could use to help him. Time was ticking away...

He strode out, shielding his eyes against the sun and followed the shade around the building to the back. _The smoker's corner._ Two gangly boys in baggy clothes were leaning against a wall puffing dejectedly. A young girl sat at their feet yawning to herself.

He walked up to them quickly. "Hey, you seen Calvin Willard around?"

"Who the hell are you?"

_Red Bandana._ _Nice manners..._."I'm supposed to help him out. I need to find him."

"You're a cop."

_Yellow Sneakers. Did these kids have no dress code? _Mick shook his head, "No. The cops have already been here. I just need to find Calvin."

Red Bandana was the first to reply, "He's gone, man."

Almost at the same time Yellow Sneakers hooted with laugher, "I heard he got busted stealing Codeine or some shit."

_Fifteen year old humanitarians. Perfect. _Mick nodded. "Yeah, he did. Any idea why he was stealing?"

The girl responded in the silence that followed, "He ran for Cassie."

Mick looked down at her sharply. She looked a waif even in the tight shirt and low riders; sharp bones and angles everywhere. Going to be a beauty though. "Ran for Cassie?"

She stared at him like he was an idiot. "That's what I said."

"What does it mean?"

"Oh man, where do _you_ live?" Yellow Sneakers had a big mouth.

Mick ignored him, his eyes fixed questioningly on the girl. She shook her head. It had been years since he'd had to interact with teenagers. He could try to win them over although God knows how, or he could badger them for information which, if he remembered anything about being a teenager, would never work. Plan F - which was...what?

The truth - Plan F. Maybe the half-unvarnished truth only. "I don't want to turn him over to the cops. I just want to find him for his parents."

"Why?"

OK, whole unvarnished truth. "They hired me to."

"Cal was dumb. He only did it to get to Cassie." The girl seemed to have no trouble telling him things

The kid in the red bandana seemed nervous. He grabbed the girl's arm roughly, half-dragging her to her feet. "Hey, shut up!"

Mick snapped. He had the boy in a choke hold against the wall before any of them noticed that he'd moved. It was a half-second before the boy's frantic struggles alerted him to the fact that he was throttling him. He set the kid back down immediately, fear washing over him. What was he doing? What had he done?

"Don't ever touch her like that again." It had to be said.

The boys backed away from him. "Crazy, you're crazy." _Fear in their eyes...how many times had he seen that look just before he struck...you can never run from the monster when the monster is you..._

The girl stayed behind, watching him turn to her.

"Cal lived near me," she said, by way of explanation. "He played with me when I was a kid."

"He sounds like a good kid."

She laughed like a cynical adult. "He was. Why'd you want to find him?"

"His parents are worried sick."

"They wanted him to get outta here," dreamily. "Mom's so high and mighty. He used to sneak away to play with us."

"Why is he running?"

"'Cos he fucked up."

Mick waited for her to elaborate. She seemed to catch on after a tense thirty seconds or so.

"Everyone wanted to be Cal's friend last year. He was big and strong; he was just too nice. He'd never hit anyone or yell things at the girls. It was crazy. It's about respect. If you ain't got no respect, nobody gives a damn about you."

"He was just staying out of trouble. His dad said he didn't believe in violence. Why'd they pick on him?"

She laughed. "Didn't believe in violence - what a pussy. You can't get away from the violence here, OK? You gonna let somebody walk all over you and hope they feel bad cos you're too pussy to stand up for yourself? Alls he had to do was hit someone once. Just once. Gotta look out for yourself here. Cal was dumb as chickenshit sometimes.

Mick winced. She sounded like Josef. He heard voices heading towards them. Few 100 metres away - _the boys? _"Where is he now?" The urgency in his voice was not lost on her. Her eyes shifted frantically. Mick couldn't let this one sway. "Nothing is gonna happen to him. I'm not gonna hurt him. I need to find him before someone else does."

"Dunno but ask Cassie," she whispered finally

"Where's Cassie?

"Darby-Dixon area. Dunno house number. Ask the hookers. Look, you shouldn't talk to her! Her ex-, man, he doesn't like people going over."

"Why?" Hurry girl, hurry. _Hundred metres and closing fast._

"He's HEM." Her voice was so low he could only make out the words with superphonic hearing.

Fucking hell, what had Calvin gotten himself into?

Mick ran for the car.

--

"Hello?"

"Beth, where are you?"

"Um, Buzzwire. Just wrapping up a story, why? Oh God, did I forget something, Josh? Was I supposed to meet you for dinner?"

There was silence for a second. "So you're not with him?"

"With whom?"

"Mick St John."

"No." Was he never going to get over it.

Josh exhaled heavily. "Thank God."

"Josh," she tried to keep her voice steady, "what's going on?"

"He just compromised a DEA investigation in Inglewood."

_Inglewood? What is Mick doing there?_ "What?"

"You know the case I've been pushing?"

"HEM, yeah."

"We finally got a kid who could pick out the Inglewood HEM guy that Tejada's been meeting with and then the kid vanishes. We've been watching the house for four days and Mick shows up today, walks over to the officers and proceeds to grill them. THEN he starts threatening them with media exposure if they're covering up anything about the boy's whereabouts....and...I just needed to make sure."

"You thought he meant _me_. You thought I would immediately run with a story that could damage your case this badly?"

"Beth, no..."

"You don't trust me." Her tone was flat.

"You know how big this case is. It looks like the LA cliques are starting to gang up together like the Mafia and if we don't blow this out now, we're sunk. I just needed to call to double check."

"I don't believe it." Beth walked over to the water cooler quickly, her angry voice starting to net her some interested looks from the other reporters. _Brilliant, I work for a gossip site.._

"Look, I've had leaks before. I couldn't take the risk again. It's just prudent, OK?"

"Yeah, but you didn't even ask me. You started out assuming I was guilty. You asked me where I was."

He didn't say anything

"How long before you trust me, Josh? Hmm?

"I trust you now and I'm sorry. But this is not about you and me. I need this contained, Beth. Do you know anything about this? Have you spoken to him today?

"No."

"Could you...?"

_Call him and ask him what he's doing because he's pissed my boyfriend off. Hi Mick, um, I know you said we needed a few days, but er, Josh needs to know what the hell is going on so...hi! Mick, what's going on...no, no good._ "Yeah, OK." _Josh needs this for his case. It's just a phone call._


	20. Chapter 20

AN: This chapter is dark and references gang violence towards women. I googled the gang that HEM is supposedly based on and sensationalised some of the information for use in the story.

--

Taking the girl's advice, he'd stopped at a series of corners in Darby-Dixon and asked the old pros for Cassie's address. They'd been more than happy to tell him about their services but they hadn't wanted to talk about Cassie. The sun was pounding down on him now, searing him centimetre by centimetre. The little voice in the back of his head, which was all that kept him sane some days, was shouting that he needed to feed; it was pressing the point, hunger sharpening in his brain. Another few minutes and he'd be leaping through the windscreen at the first human he saw, feral as the day he'd been reborn.

Mick had pulled off abruptly into an alley. Not a great situation but the long years of fighting himself and failing had at least taught him what the Boy Scouts doubtless already knew: Be prepared, be very well prepared.

Ice box on the floor under the passenger seat. Ice box on the passenger seat. He couldn't move at vamp speed. His hands were shaking. Pick up the goddamned syringe. He tried to fit the bevel into the vial of blood but it slid away. _Calm down. _The needle was skewered firmly into the cork. Syringe began to fill gloriously quickly. _Hurry, hurry! _He couldn't focus to get the bevel out - he crushed the empty vial as he wrenched it away. Blood pooled over itself, fighting it's way into his body. The exhilaration was unbearable. It coursed through his veins and arteries waking a fire that burned as the warmth spread like a numb limb coming back to life.

When his eyes had cleared, he sat upright again. _You will never do something that stupid that again._

The next corner he got lucky. Fifty dollars cash for Cassie's address and a brief run-down of her life history. She was the HEM equivalent of an It Girl. Girlfriend to one of the senior members of the Inglewood clique since she was thirteen. Ex-girlfriend now that she was almost seventeen - he liked 'em young and nubile. The pro was still talking - "...word is she's seeing some kid on the sly. They're gonna kill the little punk. Once you're HEM you can never get out. You don't mess with 'em, you know what I'm saying? I mean, we gives 'em freebies occasionally, we ain't gonna push those motherfuckers for a dime. They won't kill you quick, they'll rape you till you bleed all over the floor and then take the machetes to you. Two blocks down, sugar, on the right, no. 310. Second floor. "

He'd felt sick. Another $50 was pressed into her hands and the car leapt away. He'd lost at least forty minutes.

The cops were called out when the screaming started. Because it was Darby-Dixon, they had to suit up entirely. By the time they arrived, the screaming had stopped. The crowd outside the building was sullen and uncooperative, if not deathly afraid.

So, Mick wasn't the first one on the scene. An ambulance wailed over the orders being barked out from all directions and the eerie whispering from the straggle of people still watching with macabre interest. He cursed under his breath. Was he safe? Was this for Cal? Had they got him already?

The crowd stank in the mid-afternoon sun: sweat, cheap booze, lunch, babies. Mick pushed through to the yellow tape standing gaily outside the ramshackle building. They were bringing a stretcher out, paramedics scampering beside the girl. There was a lot of blood lost; he could smell it on her clothes, bleeding out through her stomach.

He moved quickly along the cordon, catching up with the stretcher as it neared the ambulance. He just needed three seconds. Mercifully she convulsed briefly into the disposable resuscitator held over her face. He could see her lips trying to form words, blood gurgling - she was screaming.

_Three_:

_"...pregnant, Cassie?" Calvin stroking her face as she stared up at him._

This was Cassie? This tiny girl at death's door?

_Two:_

_Machetes breaking through the door. Cal pushing Cassie away. Tall men - three. Latino - fuck. HEM. Brief struggle. Cal against a wall, two men driving fists into him - face, solar plexus, kidneys. Third man straddling a prone Cassie. "What were you thinking, puta? You fucking cunt." Hitting her. Cassie flopping, bleeding. "Leave him alone." Begging._

_One:_

_"Do it." Snarling. "You are always gonna be my property, puta." Pandemonium and gunshots. "Take him to the river."_

The ambulance was roaring to life, people scurrying out of its way. Who wanted to interfere with the burden of death?

Minutes, he had just minutes to act. Mick's phone rang; he answered automatically.

"St John."

"Mick?"

_Beth?_ He hated himself in that split second when his heart leapt.

"...listen," she was still talking, "Are you working a case down in Inglewood? Josh just..."

"Not now. I have to go." He cut her off abruptly and dialed another number.

"Y'hello?"

"Logan, Mick St John. I need you to find me a location."

"Um, well, you're _there_ and I'm _here_..."

"Logan, not now. I have a missing child and I have just minutes to find him."

"What? What kind of odds are those?"

"Real ones." The anger was flaring in his voice.

"OK OK. What am I looking for?"

"I need to know the best place to dump a body in Inglewood river. Closest and most secluded place to Darby-Dixon."

"What kind of missing kid case is this!?"

"Gang."

"I'm looking..." Logan's voice went tight and quiet. After a minute he replied,"There's too much, but most secluded would be the Bird Sanctuary. No wait, there's an abandoned area south of there. Belongs to a CM Rail property. It's a dump. Body can go straight into the river or just be hidden there."

"Thanks."

--

Beth stared at her phone in disbelief, the dial tone still buzzing.

Maureen slapped a piece of paper on her table and glanced at her worriedly. "Source hung up on you?"

"What? No."

"OK, good. Something crazy's happening in Inglewood and I want you down there. You know that story you did on HEM? Well, they just attacked a 17 year old girl - raped and shot in the stomach. Run with it, tie it in. This gang is big news at the moment."

Beth was already moving - she'd grabbed her bag at the mention of Inglewood.

"Be careful," Maureen called after her.

--

Steve was already sitting in the car. "Looks like your prayers were answered," he said sombrely.

She didn't respond, just nodded abruptly and looked back at her notes.

Beth's phone interrupted them two minutes later. Her mouth compressed as she weighed the phone in her hand.

- _beep_ -

"Yes?"

"Beth - I need a favour."

"Mick, I'm on a story -

"Call the cops for me."

"What?"

"I need some backup. I'm tracking a boy who's been kidnapped by HEM."

"Wha-...OK, what do you need exactly?"

"I need cops in every secluded area down the Inglewood river. I don't know where they are but I think they're going to be somewhere near the river. They'll be looking to dump a body. I think they might be near the Bird Sanctuary or near a dump owned by CM Rail."

"Josh is working on this case, Mick. DEA is going to hear about it."

"Good, then tell him to get the fucking army out if he has to. We don't have more than fifteen minutes to a half hour."

"OK...." She glanced up at Steve and then lowered her voice, "Be careful."

"Beth."

"Yes?"

"He's fourteen."

He heard the sharp inhalation. "OK."

Mick knew she understood. They had to make it. And he was going to be severely disadvantaged by the sun, not to mention the fact that it would be extremely inadvisable to vamp out in front of a group of people in public, no matter how secluded. He needed backup to take the spotlight off him.

--

Calvin's body was on fire. There were six HEM members all standing around, taunting him. They'd started with beating him in the apartment and forced him to watch Cassie. Then they'd dragged him here. The grass waved gently above his cropped hair and he could feel a pebble pressing into one cheek. An eye was swollen and closed and his chest burned when he tried to breathe. They'd mocked him and told him he had to be HEM to screw a HEM girl. Then they 'initiated' him: 15 seconds of three fully-grown men kicking you, punching you, hitting you, and you are not allowed to fight back. Cal couldn't have fought back if he'd wanted to.

Snippets of conversation wafted down to him but he didn't pay attention. He closed the other eye and focused on Cassie, hair flowing down her back as she cried out, the way she wiggled her toes when she was excited, how hard she tried to fight the dyslexia, how much she wanted to change, she listened to him when he talked, listened to his dreams. Loved him. Mom and Dad. Sunday lunches, Dad always trying to get him to toss a pigskin, Mom sneaking him cookies after dinner, growing up feeling so disconnected from his surroundings because of them - he was going to die. And he wasn't ready to. But he was going to.

They were hefting the machetes. They were toying with him. If he'd been a serious rival, he'd be in tiny pieces already. Death by dismemberment, and Calvin felt his stomach twisting in on itself in terror. It was such a sunny day, incongruous with death. He imagined flying a kite with the scudding clouds...never having joined the crew. _To do it all over again..._

"....ay, I think you kicked his brain too hard. The _perro_'s smiling!"

Hands grabbed Cal's shirt and lifted him. Cassie's ex-, he knew that face.

"Do you know why you're here?"

"Cassie..." he managed to speak through the haze.

Raucous laughter. "Hells no! You think you can talk to the cops about us? Huh? And we won't do nothing? And you thought _she_ could protect you?"

"I didn't...," he began and screamed as the punches fell.

They only hit him three times but it was enough for Cal to pass out.

"Just kill him now," one said.

"No, let him wake up."

Motion carried.

--

Mick pulled up at the rusty gates and saw the car parked in the shadows. They were here! The gate swung violently on it's hinges as he pushed past without checking his stride and ran down the rough track in the direction of the water. It was a huge area, God knows where they'd be.

_Blood..._. He stopped. _Six men. Calvin. Jesus, his face! Fifteen minutes ago._ Mick turned right, skidding around an old tyre and a pile of rubble. Ahead in the distance he could see a natural hollow, about six feet deep, sliding all the way to the river. Out of sight, out of hearing and he prayed he was not too late.

Calvin was crying on the ground, one arm wrapped around his torso, the other pulled away from his body as a boot crushed his hand. The first machete began to swing...


	21. Chapter 21

AN: This is not the happiest chapter before Christmas. Please be aware that there is a fair amount of violence and gore.

--

"Rafa, it's been two minutes. Wake the kid up. I've got a _regalo_ for him! " The burly giant waved a machete eagerly.

"Callate, Luis! The _perro_ will wake up in a minute. Lemme finish this cigarette, eh?"

"Put it out on him and wake him up." That was Jorge's suggestion. He laughed raucously at his own joke, the green teardrop at the corner of his eye creasing into the skin.

Rafael Barraza was thirty-one, an ex-paramilitary 'freedom fighter' with the El Salvadorean rebels and one of the powerhouses in Inglewood's HEM brotherhood. Hernan Montoya was fifty-six and took orders from Rafael because he had to. Hernan made sure that nobody else in the clique got treated any better. The chain of command wavered slightly under him, but he always had Rafa's sadistic streak to use as leverage. Rafa grew up protecting his father's field with a machete. As he told Cassie, the tattoo of two hands joined in prayer between his shoulder blades was an omen to everyone of the prophecy that his mother had made when he was four: _This boy will do great things. El Salvador will hear of the things he has done._ He worked his whole life to be somebody, he wasn't about to let anything happen to that dream.

Hernan was standing sullenly to the side, watching. This was a mistake, this stupid kid don't know nothing. If only Rafa hadn't got caught up with that puta. He'd had a taste of her at the initiation and then he'd caught a fever, had to go back for more and more. And that stupid slut, she was harbouring a snitch. What a fucking pile of shit this was!

The last two men were standing quietly and watching Hernan watch the boy. Except for his face, Cal looked almost untouched, Hernan knowing exactly where and how to hit him so as to avoid immediate bruising. A talent, and one that was highly regarded in the brotherhood.

Juan elbowed his partner lightly and whispered, "Miguel, man, he's sweating like a pig about this."

"That man is a pussy. Too bad Rafa don't see it."

Rafa looked at the lit butt almost dreamily then pressed it into Cal's forehead. The boy lurched as the pain dragged him back to consciousness, knives stabbing along his ribs again. He tried to think of all the prayers he had learned in church - such a long time ago - but his fuddled brain would not co-operate. Instead he found himself murmuring over and over a phrase he had seen tattooed on Cassie's back, 'Perdoname Madre Mia por mi Vida Loca.' _Forgive me, mother of mine, for my crazy life._

Calvin lay crying on the ground, one arm wrapped around his torso, the other pulled away from his body as a boot crushed his hand. The first machete began to swing...

--

Mick missed by two point eight seconds. Even with vampire speed, the hundred metres was too far.

The machete settled into Calvin's flesh with a sickening crunch. No attempt was made to retrieve it, every eye was fixed on a dark blur, about six feet high, moving towards them so quickly that it looked almost as if it was a flickering holograph. Rafael stood on the right, watching, hands still holding the wooden handle, while Jorge across from him forgot to grind Cal's fingers under his boot quite so hard. The young body flailed wildly for a moment; Mick could see the specks of dirt floating as it writhed.

He hit the two men crouched over the boy while still moving with preternatural celerity. Their legs fell away under them, nails futilely clawing at the death grip around their throats as he checked rapidly and slammed them into the earth; hands tightened, crushing, not hard enough to kill, oh no, he'd seen the butchering begin and every instinct was screaming for permission to shred them slowly.

"What the fuck...?" echoing from four throats behind him.

His left hand unclenched from around the older man's throat and then drove itself into the face, snapping his nose. The green teardrop was stretched tight, the eye open and staring in fury. A single roar then silence as Mick wrenched quickly - the jaw was dislocated - and Jorge passed out from the pain.

These guys were quick for gang members. Mick had already heard the hissing sounds as their hands moved to grip weapons - guns, machetes, knives. He half-turned before a barrage of gunshots sounded. Four bullets buried themselves instantly in his back. _9mm_, he recognised them from the feel of the damage. Pitched forward with the momentum, he pulled Cassie's ex- up behind him and listened to the bubbling from the man's throat as another three bullets, fired too quickly to stop, shook Rafael like a puppet dancing on a string. Counting the bullets was instinctive - _Only three...that means the fourth..._.Mick whirled, the grown man dangling grotesquely from one hand, and he used the body to meet the machete that was aimed at his legs. Military trick. Take the legs down and you have the upper hand, literally.

There was a gratifying slurp as Rafael's intestines began spilling out of the gash in his abdomen. Hernan was shrieking in the background, "_Joder_! Luis, kill the motherfucker! Rafa, RAFA!" Luis swung again, with deadly speed, and Mick ducked just in time; he felt the machete whistle by his ear. Two more men running at him. Mick's foot shot out, kicking the giant in the groin and then he had kneed Luis' chin, watched the blood spurt from a cut lip and kicked his face in. Just in time because the machetes were almost within striking range. He moved with vampire quickness, and the former assassins of priests and judges found themselves with bloodlust in their eyes, raised cleavers, and an empty space between them. They turned simultaneously to face Mick and then staggered back as Rafael's weight bore down on them, the blood and waste spewing everywhere.

- _click_ -

Mick heard the semi-automatic cock again and started forward. Cal groaned in that instant and Mick's head twisted towards the noise. _He's alive?_ That was all the distraction needed before he felt another few rounds pumped into him. One of them cut straight through the chain round his neck, he watched the pendant glinting as it fell.

Hernan barely saw him move, but suddenly Mick was standing in front of him. _Madre mia! His eyes, like demon cataracts!_ Hernan was almost blubbering with fear, the gun still pointed straight at Mick, and there was a loud report as the final bullet shot into Mick's chest.

"You really shouldn't have done that." A man's voice, low and terrifying, like the things you scamper from in the Columbian jungles.

And Hernan watched in horror as the demon-thing crushed the barrel of the gun and raised the mangled piece of metal over his head. Then all Hernan felt was pain slicing through his skull from behind the ear. The demon-thing was bending over him, shouting....

"Who ordered this?"

Mick knew, in the rational part of his brain, that he was damaging them but not killing them, with the exception of the disembowelled guy. When he'd seen the satisfaction in that sick son of a bitch's face as the machete cut into Calvin he knew there'd be no mercy in that quarter. Letting the gang bury a few bullets in him had been perfect justice. Now he wanted answers. The older, blubbering man - he could smell the fear. He knew his eyes had changed and nothing else; he was still very much in control.

"Tell me." Ferocious.

His hand shot out to grab the cretin's jaw. But these men were not ex-paramilitary for nothing; training reasserted itself. The knife blade entered between the third and fourth ribs; Mick hadn't even noticed the hand move. He dropped forward slightly, gasping, and Hernan did what any good guerrilla warrior would do - press the advantage. He bit the hand, hard, hard enough that he felt the metal filling in his teeth wrench out. Slick blood pooled in to take its place.

Mick screamed, tearing his hand away. _Silver! He has silver alloy fillings!_ The rage dissipated a little with the pain as he stumbled to the his feet and back-pedalled slightly. A machete handle caught him at the base of the skull as he was pulling the dagger out single-handedly. Miguel was beyond control, battering shoulders and head as Juan walked in front of Mick. A sharp kick and Mick was flat on his back looking up at the three men. He tried to catch their words but his body was screaming to change and take them all out instantly. _Can't focus. Focus. Now. Fight._ His head was swimming, the pounding blurring his vision. Hands grabbed his shoulders, under the armpits and then someone was hitting him, working him over. It was a typical gang beating, but they'd misjudged him badly.

The blurring stopped, control flooding back in. Mick glanced at his hand - it wasn't healing fast, silver traces blocked the wound and the sun drained his strength and healing. He closed his eyes briefly - _Not now, not now. I can take them without it_ - fighting the change. A particularly vicious kidney punch doubled him over. He felt a ring crack against his jaw. And then the rage was back, filling every particle of his being. He heard the machete hefted and took a deep breath.

Hernan, who, as the most experienced torturer, had been landing the punches, saw the man lift his head and he almost wet himself. It was true - not his imagination! There was barely a mark on the demon-thing's face, the cut lips pulled back in a feral snarl and the eyes...clouding over...again. The machete trembled in his fingers.

A soft chuckle from their prisoner made Juan and Miguel look at him swiftly, but not quickly enough. Miguel, to Mick's right, never understood how the next sequence of motions was possible. He forever maintained that it was a sign of the Holy Spirit that God would spare this man. The man who had been shot, knifed, beaten by the best but who by the grace of God fought six gang members to save a boy...that story was a famous one in Miguel's village when he went home at the age of forty-four after twenty years in prison, and became an ordained priest. The man swung round as his right arm pulled out of the grip on his shoulder, the hand whipping back to fasten round Miguel's biceps. Then the next thing Miguel heard was a loud pop as the dislocation registered in his body.

Mick used the split-second commotion to leverage himself against Juan as he kicked out viciously at Hernan's torso. A rib cracked under the force and the torturer went over backwards, gasping. A sucker-punch left Juan heaving and on his knees and a solid right-hook knocked him out cold. Mick hefted the machete handle - thirty seconds and he could show them what it felt like....And then the blessed sounds of sirens were blaring in the distance. It was almost over.

He walked back towards the glinting object and slid the pendant into his pocket. Finally screwed up his courage to listen and he could've jumped for joy - _Calvin, that thready heartbeat is the best thing I've heard all day._

Mick stood over the boy, breathing in deeply. The smell of blood was making him nauseous and hungry all at the same time, the sun was burning and the traces of silver tormented him. He needed to get home, feed and sleep. _But, Calvin! Alive. Thank God, he's still alive!_ The machete blow had been tentative and misaligned, Rafael's aim thrown off by Mick's sudden appearance in the distance. Not life-threatening. The edge was buried in Cal's shoulder, had done severe damage to the bones and ligaments there, but that was nothing there that couldn't be fixed. Mick moved his head further down Cal's body, listening for the tell-tale signs of internal bleeding. He found it in the abdominal cavity. _Fuck!_ The beating had been life-threatening; they'd ruptured a kidney. Mick could hear the blood gurgling in Cal's throat and the haemorrhage beginning. He needed surgery.

Then he looked down at himself. No coat, he'd been smart and left that in the car this time. But fucking fuck, he had bullet holes in his shirt and no marks on his body. To make things worse, there weren't enough bullets to be found in the terrain. The cops weren't stupid, they'd realise something was off if they brought forensics in to double-check his statement. He sighed...he couldn't take the bullets out now, there was no time. But hopefully the department would conclude that there was no way they could find the stray bullets in an area this big. _Only one thing to do_. He ripped the henley down the middle and methodically tore it into strips, tucking the ones with bullet holes into the pockets of his jeans. The cops were making an unholy racket as they attempted to traverse the area safely - the silence couldn't be helping their nerves. Mick began to wrap the cloth around Cal's left arm, setting up a makeshift sling to cradle the crushed hand.

"Over here," he yelled. There was an immediate thundering of forty pairs of booted feet as they followed his voice to the edge of the hollow, rifles cocked and ready. Mick felt the wave of disbelief virtually slam into him as they took in the scene.

"We need paramedics," he called out, the urgency in his voice snapping them to attention. The hustle began again, orders were given and yellow-tape was rolled out...

He'd avoided looking at Cal's face for so long, but he did now. Such a little kid. Such a big little kid. Cal's eyes were open. He seemed to be trying to say something. Mick listened carefully, all he could hear was wheezing breath, then "..live...a...live..." and he felt his heart break. "Hang in there buddy, you're gonna be just fine. Your parents are waiting for you."

"..per-...mia..vida loca.."

The paramedics were hurrying down. They nodded at Mick as he moved out of the way.

"I think he has a ruptured kidney," Mick heard himself say. "They were landing kidney punches and he's just a kid..."

They nodded. He nodded. And then he walked up the slope, the sun pummelling him mercilessly.

--

He moved to the nearest DEA officer. "The girl?" Mick asked tightly.

The man had the grace to look upset. He shook his head gently. "Too unstable. She bled to death an hour ago."

He didn't acknowledge how much he cared till he got three feet away.

"Mick?"

He'd turned slowly to face her, noting the pale spots in her cheeks.

"Are you OK?" She was tentative. Not pushy. Almost scared.

He suddenly found himself fighting terror - he'd been so close to losing it. This connection he had with Beth drained him, made him focus on his own selfish needs. There was a child who died because he hadn't been fast enough, smart enough, stable enough. _I had to stop and feed because I was punishing myself for wanting her. I could have stopped HEM. I could have stopped this whole thing._ The sun was shining straight onto his uncovered face and chest. He could feel the skin start to peel slightly, the blood vessels expanding. "Yeah. I need to get out of the sun."

_He looks like someone stuck a dagger into his heart_, Beth thought privately. Mentally, the reporter persona contradicted slowly - it wouldn't do anything even if they did. "You found him and you saved his life." Trying to remind him of how she saw him. _Guardian..._

Mick's face turned even stonier, "He's still in critical condition, we'll see. I just didn't get here fast enough."

"Is _that_ what you're standing there hating yourself for? Listen to me, if it weren't for you nobody would have found him till little pieces washed up downstream!"

"Beth, just let it go, OK? I need to go."

"St John." Davis had impeccable timing, naturally.

"Carl." Mick nodded at the lieutenant.

"Thank you, man. Seriously, thank you."

Beth stared at Carl for a second, she'd never heard him this effusive before.

"Is he gonna be OK?" That was all Mick cared about, right now. That, and he needed to feed, soon.

"Too early to tell, but there's a good chance he'll pull through." Carl hesistated and then his words poured out in a rush, "I don't know how you did it, but thatwas...I mean, there were six guys and you barely have a scratch on you. And the kid's still alive. This is gonna be some story. You OK?"

This time there was a ghost of a smile on Mick's face. "Yeah. Just need to get home."

"Hey, you shouldn't be driving. I mean, I know you're not injured but physically you have to be beat. We can get someone to drive you home."

"No." Human concern was really starting to bother him. He was on edge enough as it was. "I'm fine. Thanks for the offer."

Cal looked at him thoughfully. "You really show up on the strange ones. Lee Jay, arms dealers, stabbings, now gang..."

"Guess I have nine lives." Raised eyebrows. "I really just need to get home for a while."

"Alright. Look, we need to put this scum away, but under the circumstances I guess your statement can wait a bit. I'll make it OK with DEA. Come by tomorrowat the latest." Carl shook his head quizzically, then walked away

Mick followed Carl's movements until he caught sight of the one other person he really didn't want to run into - Josh.

"I'll drive," Beth said firmly beside him.

He groaned inwardly. Of course, just the kind of stupid thing she would say, with that look in her eyes that almost made him believe she cared as much as he did. "I don't need your help right now, Beth. I'm going home and I need to go now. Every second I'm out here saps me, OK? And Josh is here, you should..."

"You need to feed, don't you?"

"Yes. I do. I'll see you ar-"

She put out her hand and grabbed his arm before he could move. "Is that why? You know I don't care. How are you going to - ? Do you need me to...?"

"No! Look, this is not 'giving it a few days'."

"I don't care, Mick!"

"_I_ do."

The look on her face shattered him. He couldn't do it, couldn't keep _saying_ these things to her like she didn't mean anything. Feeding off Beth, God no, not again. The memories of the aftermath were still fresh - the intensified primal yearning for her, unaccountable hunger, and then the devastating knowledge that she didn't want him, that it had all been a big mistake. He leaned down till she could see the banked fury in his eyes. "Josh is here," he said, enunciating every word as if it were it's own sentence.

"I thought we agreed to be friends. Or did you forget that as you rushed out the door?" She was angry too now. And miserable, he could smell the misery.

_She still cares!_ Swiftly followed by, _I must have been mad to agree to that_. "We are. But I need to be alone right now." He let some of the pain seep into his voice, "Beth, I'm in agony standing here."

She let go of his arm and took a deep breath. "Alright. Call me when you're ready to talk to me again. Please."

She was almost trembling with the need to wrap her arms round him. So scared, when he'd hung up on her, then when he'd called her. So _guilty_! Confused...._Just admit it, fucking desperate. You're pathetic._ She turned and moved back towards the commotion. _Just keep your mind on the job, Turner. Mind on the job._ Steve would be waiting.

He watched her walk away, his head still bent. _Too far gone now, St John. Should have stopped it back when you had the chance. But I didn't and now she sees me as a...she talks like she expects me to be there always, and how do I gainsay her? I don't want to. If something happened to her -....I can do this. I've done this for fifty-five years. Control and balance._

_Dear God, let me just make it to the car...._


	22. Chapter 22

It is a well known fact that vampires can't go into direct sunlight.

Mick's face and chest were raw and peeling by the time he reached the last police cordon, hand futilely shielding his eyes. Shade, keep to the shade. Walk in shadows, the three trees standing between him and the gate. He forced himself, with what was left of his belaboured self-control, to walk past the huddle of inviting bodies with their veins and arteries steadily pulsing blood. _Thrum - thrum - thrum..._desperate cravings. Eyes changing, teeth forcing his lips apart. He felt the upper lip tear from the forcefulness of the change. He was scurrying by the time he passed through the gate, body moving stiffly. The red flare on his skin had given way to a sickly, jaundiced white, which in turn was fading, already showing signs of irreversible damage - skin was starting to char. His head was bent low, the hand held upright against the sun shaking so badly it was a miracle he still had any muscle control over it....Coraline had warned him, Josef had told him, fifty-five years of experience should have unequivocably taught him that if you expose unclad vampires to sunlight, they turn to jerky.

The pain was so intense Mick could barely see. _Car, car._..colours were wavering. _Green. Green what? Where? _For a second absolute panic seized him as his eyes searched the space around him without a sign of recognition. His body moved instinctually into a nearby copse; the cool shade felt like leather belts lashing at his skin. He moaned softly. _Phone_. He wasn't going to make it. There was only one person to call. It was time.

"Mick St John. Direct sunlight - _[gasping]_ - burned. _[swallowed thickly]_ I'm not going to....please. Now. Inglewood. _[voice fading]_ CM...Rail lot. Cops - be careful."

He slid the phone back into his pocket and dry heaved with pain at the movement. One hand found the bark of a tree. The moments passed rapidly, the dank shade was comforting, solemn trees bearing witness. He stood precariously, for how long he wasn't sure. The simple, youthful part of him that had been hidden for so long suddenly emerged, _Not the way I thought it would be. But fitting._ Life for life. Peace for peace. Body...her body. His mind wavered slightly, remembered a different kind of pain. And the pleasure. Knees finally refused to listen to orders anymore, his body was buckling underneath him. _Josef shaking his head, "Idiot!" I know_, he thought wildly, _I know, buddy_.

And then suddenly, pounding on all his senses like a drum, there it was:

_Blood.  
Blood.  
Thrum-thrum-thrum. Blood._

_Oh God, no._

_Heartbeat._

_Blood._

_Yes! Yes!_

The mindless will to live swept over him as he turned, fangs bared, and grasped the human that had come to an abrupt stop so close by him. Slammed the body against a tree and then his mouth at a throat, pausing. Something in the back of his mind forcing him...skimming to the right of the jugular. _Don't kill it!_ Fangs scraping. Pain radiating as he half-stumbled, half-fell against the prey. He heard his snarls rasping softly, waiting, held back, the barest vestiges of himself still fighting it. Then he breathed in the scent of rich blood and all was lost. Mick reared his head viciously and then - stopped, crying out in pain...the burning from a spot on his shoulder was unbearable. It trickled down the wrecked flesh like..._water_?

She was staring at him in terror, her breath sobbing, the tears pouring down her cheeks. His eyes flashed again and she saw the hazel slide back in - _Mick!_ - just for a second, and then they turned yellow again. He fell forward and almost crushed her.

"Mick! Mick..." Skin was peeling away from his body, long swathes breaking apart like rough bark under her fingers. She gagged suddenly, _he's burning to death in the sunlight_. Terrified lest someone should see them, Beth helped him fall to the ground. He was too heavy for her to do it gently. The thump of his body hitting the earth and the soft whimpering tore at her. She ran her hands through his pockets for a second. _Phone! Slow down!_ Josef was on speed-dial.

"It's two fucking p.m., Mick"

"Josef, it's Beth." Almost hysterical.

"What - happened to Mick?"

"I'm not sure. He's collapsed. I think it's the sun, it's how he looked in the desert. But worse."

She _was_ hysterical. "How long has he been out in the sun?"

"About half an hour."

It didn't make sense. "That's not enough time...."

"He's not wearing a shirt."

"What?" The word exploded over the phone, disbelief and fear sharpening it's edge.

"His - his skin is...it's charred and falling..."

"He needs blood. Let him feed." Matter of fact, an order in fact.

"He passed out. I can't wake him!" Sobs interrupting her words.

"Get to his car. Under the passenger seat will be an ice box. There should be a syringe and some vials of blood in there. You're going to have to inject him in the next few minutes."

_Or he'll die_...neither of them said it.

"O-OK."

"Get him to shade and stay there. I'm sending someone over."

She could almost hear him screaming as he hung up, "FUCK."

In the car; the car was just ten feet away. The keys were in his left pocket, she fumbled the door open and wrestled with the coat lying across the passenger seat. Underneath was the ice box. Two vials left. There were voices coming towards them. Beth hurried back. Mick wasn't saying anything, he didn't appear to be conscious. Beth gritted her teeth and, slipping her hands under his shoulders, she dragged him two feet to the right, hiding them behind a car. She tried not to look at the trail of dark brown...matter...in their wake. She filled the syringe, trying not to notice how his head lolled against her like a rag doll. _No!_ Then panic as she tried to remember where the veins were. He was going to die and she had the blood to save him, but where did she inject it?

The dark shadow that swung itself down beside her startled her badly. A hand reached out to grab the syringe from Beth and she watched helplessly as the hand was joined by another - in concert the two hands stretched out Mick's arm and effortlessly plunged the syringe in. The barrel began to empty.

"Give me the other vial."

The blonde woman moved like an acrobat. From the head-to-toe black coverings on a hot day, Beth's sluggish brain concluded only one thing, _Vampire. She knows what to do_. When both vials were emptied into Mick, the woman raised a bland face to Beth. Beth wasn't fooled, the vampire had eyes like a snake, waiting to pounce.

"And who are you?" Seductive, menacing.

"Beth Turner. I'm a - friend of Mick's." Worry for Mick greater than any fear. The vampire was helping him and that made her OK in Beth's book.

The woman didn't seem concerned. She nodded briefly and then moved seamlessly into a half-crouch.

"Cops," she said softly. "You need to distract them. I'm gonna put him into the van." The unmarked, white van moved slowly towards them, backing up so that the double doors were adjacent to the car shielding Mick. When Beth didn't move, she raised her eyebrows silently. Mick already seemed a little better; some of the was charring less severe than it had been, almost piebald in places.

Beth moved. She walked away from the copse towards the group of policemen congregating near the iron gates. She didn't look back, but she stopped once to look under her feet as she stepped on a piece of brown, charred....ash. It crumbled to _ash_, nothingness. Well Mick wasn't ash! So he has to be OK. He'll be OK.

"Excuse me," she walked around the cops so they had to turn to face her, away from the blonde woman and Mick. They broke off, sunglasses hiding their expressions. "I'm looking for ADA Lindsey, please. Press." She flashed her card.  
"He's over there." They indicated the hollow. The paramedics were loading a body into the back of the waiting ambulance. She thought of Mick in a van.  
"Thank you."

--

Steve was not happy.

"Beth, what's going on?! Maureen just called, she's asking where the live report is. I got the money shot of the kid, but you just disappeared."

Beth rubbed her face tiredly. "I'm sorry," she said. "There was something that I remembered that I wanted to...pursue. Sorry, sorry, Steve. OK, let's go." _Switch into news whore persona_. And Beth Turner, confident and suave, was standing in front of a camera reporting:

"Fifteen minutes ago, the scene behind me was one of chaos. Earlier today this news station received a tip off about a gang execution in the Inglewood area. Acting on that information, police have just foiled the attempted murder of fourteen year old Calvin Willard. Six men thought to be leading members of the Hermanos Muerte brotherhood are being held for the attempt. Calvin was under DEA protection originally, but fearing reprisals from the gang, he fled his parents home four days ago. It has not been made clear exactly where he was hiding or how he was tracked down, but it is a certainty that this young life was almost lost today.

They brought him here, to the field just behind me where they planned to dismember Calvin and dump his body in the river. Five machetes and six guns were recovered by police. We can report that Calvin is still alive. He suffered a machete blow to his right shoulder and there is evidence of torture and abuse. However, paramedics arrived on the scene at the same time as the police and they have just moved him to the Daniel Freedman Memorial Hospital, where sources say that he is in a stable condition. Reports on the condition of the six men are less positive. The exact nature and source of their injuries is unclear, but it is thought that at some point the six men turned on each other. One is believed to have been shot by his own companions and then disembowelled with a machete, while the others sustained some physical trauma. They are being transported to and unidentified location by ambulance.

The execution is thought to have been interrupted by a public minded citizen who distracted the gang members until the police arrived. Further details to follow as we receive them. But one thing is for certain, if not for this man, the price for Calvin's actions would have been far too high to condone. A source in the District Attorney's office maintains that the leaders of the local HEM gangs are starting to work together to coordinate their agendas. If this movement from splintered groups to well-oiled machine isn't stopped, the cost will be counted in bodies: children's, women's, innocent men's.

This is Beth Turner for BuzzWire."

She shouldn't have said that about Mick; it was unlike her to offer an opinion. She always maintained that you provided the facts only. But this was different. _Guardian, damn him!_

**Two days later...**

The phone rang at ten in the morning. Beth groaned. She'd got in really late from dinner with Josh. They were dating again. It was....Sweet maybe was the best word for it? Endearing. Like a puppy.

"Hello?"

"Hey."

The word, the tone, that voice, had her scrambling upright in bed. "Mick! You're OK?" _He's alive. You stupid, foolish, incredible man!_

He chuckled. "Yeah. It took a while though. Sorry I didn't call earlier. I had some explaining to do to Carl on this um, urgent case I took..."

There didn't seem to be any viable response for her to give, so she went with a non-committal, "Oh."

"Josef tells me that you were poised to stick a needle full of blood into me."

So they weren't going to talk about the almost-feeding. "There was a woman. I didn't know where to inject it so she did it instead."

"Yeah, I know."

"She just showed up out of nowhere. Less than five minutes after I called Josef."

"That would be the Cleaner. I called her for help a few minutes before you showed up." His tone was flat. It wasn't exactly a lie. He had called for help. In disposing of his body...

"I see," she said slowly. "Mick, you said you didn't need my help. And then five minutes later when I see you, you're dying. It was even worse than the desert...."

He understood the question implied, "I know. I didn't expect it to be that bad. But I'm fine now. Are you OK?"

"Yes."

There was an awkward silence for a few seconds.

"Thank you," he said softly, "for helping to save my life again."

She was still angry deep inside, that he'd refused her offer and then she'd had to do it anyway. "You could have died! Is that less important than asking for help?"

"I did ask for help," he said reflexively, thinking back to the garbled message he'd poured out. _Oh, no._ He hadn't meant to say it like that. "Beth, I mean -"

"It's OK."

"No, it's not. You're upset. i didn't ask you because - you had work, and I needed to leave. And Josh was there."

She was silent. Yes, Josh was there. And Josh was her 'here and now'. She needed to remember that. Remember Sarah. This could all get too seductive too fast. "I understand. I react according to human rules. I forget sometimes that it works differently for you. You're OK now..."

"I'm OK now," he confirmed. "I have a favour to ask, Beth. That's sort of why I'm calling as well."

Beth stiffened. "Oh?"

"Yeah. It's not something I want to discuss over the phone though. Can I come over tonight?"

"Well, Josh is supposed to come over for dinner, but he is working the HEM case at the moment..."

"That's OK. I don't want to interrupt your dinner plans." A shade too quick, as if denial would stall the jealousy.

"Come by around six. Josh is never home before seven-thirty if he's on a case."

**CUE - Episode 11.**


	23. Chapter 23

AN: Happy New Year, everyone! I just wanted to say 'Thank you' again for all the comments. I'm a bit of a coughcommentwhorecough so the responses I read make me very happy. :D If you read but don't comment - thanks for reading!

Onwards and upwards to ep. 11.

--

_Hello, my name is Josef and my best friend is an idiot. He's also a vampire, albeit an extremely reluctant one when he isn't out getting his kicks by almost-dying or punishing some bad guys that just happen to get in his way. When he's in a fight, I'll bet he enjoys those fangs and that power more than he would ever admit. He's young and he makes every mistake in the book, but he leads a charmed life. I suppose I could say the same about myself, but I won't. For the same reasons he won't say it about himself._

_We could both have whatever we wanted from this epic lifetime. I could if I let go of my heart. Mick, if he let go of his guilt. Sans Coraline, I am the sole tempter from the vampire world. And sad to say, I'm losing to a mortal. _

--

Evil always has a face. It used to be bearded like a nanny goat, two horns, hoofed and a tail. Then evil got sophisticated. Now it fronts wars, animosity, atrocity and the holy grail of individual need. Those are big words for a small concept, just as evil is a tiny, almost fragile word for a notion that bleeds with horror. Evil is not chaos. It is not doubt or death. It is a method in the madness, a tic in the eye, if you will. The small counterpoint to normalcy. There is no safe way to react. No way to plan or...anything.

For fifty-five years, Mick had applied that description to himself. He told himself that nobody got close because he couldn't bear to see his monstrosity reflected in their eyes. It was half-true. But it could be done; there were relationships that existed. It was rare, but it was real. The truth was that he just didn't know how to be with people. He hadn't known since he was twenty-three. When Coraline turned him, it just got worse. Vampirism is seductive. No high can compare, no crutch can be so powerful, no hold over another can be so complete as with the knowledge that you are the supreme predator. In the dark, where he couldn't see the human furniture he'd carefully collected, in the pitch black where his eyes and his teeth felt more like a part of his soul than the hated ramifications of his choices....he knew.

If she'd thought to ask, he would have acquiesced. Who wouldn't? He'd have looked at her like Beth looked at him, with awe, thunderstruck! Yes, live forever, yes, be with the woman you want by your side, _forever_! Forever was key. If she'd played up forever, she'd have had him. Mick had lived his whole mortal adult life on his own terms - greedy, heedless, cocky and lucky; he would have rivaled Josef for hedonism. But for whatever reason, that was the only thing Coraline did wrong. It was funny...she was - is - so supremely confident, but put a heart into the equation and they were both equally damaged. Untrusting because they couldn't be trusted themselves. If she'd trusted him, well, it would have been a very different version of hell. As it was, the nightmare threw into sharp relief everything he had pushed away - family, friends, trust, love, security, support. Sort of like an addict in withdrawal for the first time, he broke. Often.

It was ironic that what had been so vilified in his conduct by human standards became a shining moment in his life. Bedding women seemed tame compared to draining them, bar fights seemed less final than the pleasure of the hunt, broken promises to his family a boon versus absolute silence. Then he'd recovered a measure of his soul and recovered the burden of guilt, and it had been one of the most liberating experiences of his life.

For a long time Mick had thought that he was unique in this respect. Josef seemed to have let go of guilt a long time ago - four hundred years is a long time to hold on to pain. Not true; Mick realised again how self-centred he still was. They all carried pain of some kind; the curse was that you carried it through eternity with no recourse, no way to make amends, but with all the time in the world to watch the consequences.

He laughed softly to himself. _I'm getting morbid again_. He wanted absolution, forgiveness, someone to tell him he was loved after all, that her heart would break on the days she didn't see him. Someone to hold even for the short time when they could be together. _Someone, St John? It doesn't sound hypothetical just because you avoid saying her name..._.And then there was that small matter of remembering her: _the taste the texture if he lives till the end of time when the sun explodes and burns him to dust all he will want to remember was how she called and how she moved and how she loved..._

He stood up, feeling the sweat start up on his skin, and set the half-full glass of blood near the fireplace. Who was he kidding? And what the hell did he do now? It wasn't as though she didn't know he felt more than friendship for her. She just didn't know how much more or how terrified it made him. He knew she cared. She'd stayed with him, near him, the whole time he'd been dying. Even the Cleaner had been surprised. Not that that meant anything. He should know - how often had he pushed her away emotionally, only to re-appear and stand by her when she needed him. Besides she'd already chosen Josh. _Well, not exactly._ Mick felt a predatory smirk rising on his lips, _She may have chosen him, but she wanted me the very next day. Maybe I should tell her and let her choose properly._ Images of Beth rose unbidden: cradled against him exhausted and replete, thrashing and moaning and calling his name as she came, holding him when he cried, teasing and laughing, eating...

The smile changed, it became softer and sadder. Mick laughed at himself gently. _I start out with sex and end with all the simple things that I loved, that she loves, and that I can't take away from her. But God do I want to tell her, just so I can lay the burden at someone else's feet for a change. _

Over an hour to go. He was hard from the memories, sweating with lust and wrung-out emotionally. _Maybe I should get a shrink...there's an idea. Sweating anyway, might as well sweat some more._ He pulled his shirt off, swinging his arms gently to test the new skin, and then dropped to begin the first set of twenty push-ups.

--

Mick's phone rang as he was walking out the door. Josef, of course. Back in town for two days and already he had his 'Calamity Mick' radar on full alert.

"What do you want?"

"And hello to you too."

"Yeah yeah, you can skip that part. Caller ID, remember? What's up?"

"I'm doing the..hang on a second [Ryder, what's that word again?]...B.F.F thing and checking up to make sure you didn't try any fun activities that might involve sunbathing, silver or fire today."

"B.F.F?" Mick asked slowly.

"It means...[more whispered conversation in the background] Best Friends Forever apparently."

"Another billion dollar merger make you happy today?" _Or did you hit your head on something?_

"Hmm? No. Today was slow. Hostile takeover for $200 mill...and aren't you the sneaky bastard? You think the Cleaner stuck me with your bill by accident?"

_Bingo!_ "OK, why do you have my bill?"

"Good question. Probably because you've been unconsicous through stupidity. Come and get it now; it's burning a hole in my desk! I loathe unaccountable expenses, they remind me of- GST." The word rolled off his tongue with venom.

"Sure. I'll see you later, Josef."

"From what the OED says, it seems quite clear that 'later' and 'now' are not from the same root word, right?"

Mick rolled his eyes. "I've got some errands to run and then I'll come over."

"Right. Give her my love too. Oh wait, you're not giving her _your_ love, are you? So just give her my love then. It's probably more than she can handle anyway."

"Good_bye_, Josef."

"Good luck, lover boy. Try not to impale yourself on anything sil-...[dial tone]."

It was a beautiful night. The heatwave had finally broken; LA no longer shimmered from the bright fog of the day. One of the wonderful things about being a vampire in the city is that you can look up and actually see the stars. Not many humans can. Mick remembered the first time he'd stopped and taken notice. It had been ten weeks after his Change and he'd been hunting. When he finally cornered the girl in one of the many abandoned parking lots, he'd crushed her larynx to prevent any screaming. He hadn't wanted to, she was breathless with terror and her voice was gone, throat numb from running and sobbing at the same time; Coraline always insisted though. He'd been thrilled; the chase was like foreplay and this one had spunk! No kidding, she'd kneed him in the groin, the little bitch. And then he'd held her up against against the metal fence and looked up and...there they were, twinkling down at him as they had never before. He hadn't been able to feed that night. He'd sat in a room and cried the whole time till the sun came out and chased the beauty away.

--

Beth's bedroom was the coolest room in the house. It faced south, away from the sun and was open to the breeze that flew in over the low roofs behind her. She'd been grateful for small mercies when the world was sweltering. The lamp threw shadows on the floor, little rainbows glinting where her feet had stood after her shower. It was strange but the darkness almost felt...masculine. All-embracing. Exciting.

Tonight, she was nervous. Almost as nervous as she'd been giving her first live report for BuzzWire, which basically meant that she could be dying inside but she'd be fine on the surface. _Good!_ The bed behind her reflected hazily in the mirror. Beth closed her eyes tight, _he is fine_. The memory of charred skin didn't leave though. That body, she'd held that body, run her hands down that broad, muscled back - _all I feel is unaccountable need pulling his face to mine my hands in the curls stubble tickles my skin I can hear the bed creak and the sheets whisper and_ - and then it had almost shredded itself under her hands.

Body on hers, mouth on hers. How do you separate one man from the other? She hadn't let Josh touch her since she and Mick....There is no way for your body to stay true at that moment, the comparisons were inevitable. And this was not something she had ever had to consider before. Beth grimaced mockingly at her reflection, had she really imagined it would be this easy? Yes, she'd almost made her choice. She was trying really hard with Josh, rekindling love and desire for him. She knew it was there, it had been there just this week. But somehow, now that she'd had time to live with the decision she'd made in New York, somehow those wonderful human emotions kept being usurped by something she didn't want to admit to.

_I don't have to admit anything, but fine, I'll admit it; I'm a big girl. I have a crush. I was in lust. He's a great guy, we had one night together and that's it. Now we're friends. We can be just friends - it's allowed. This will fade as long as I don't make a big deal out of it._ But watching him literally fall apart in her hands - she'd never wanted to see that. Stupid, goddamned stubborn man. All he'd needed to do was to ask for help. _Help how? Oh Beth, will you walk me to my car? Hold your hands in front of me and block out the sun?....Feed me?_

She'd offered and he'd refused and then - he almost had. That's how she knew he was on the verge of death. He couldn't talk, couldn't stop himself. Beth rubbed her nose reflectively. Intellectually, God, she knew she had a crush. _Look at him! And...I mean __look__ at him! Feline grace, that heart-stopping smile, he radiates power...._ Mick was the ultimate bad boy but...nice. He just wasn't hers. _He's not for me. This is crazy. I'm crazy. No, it's not, Beth, it's easy. You don't want to be with him. Just remember that. There are reasons why it can never work - not the least of which is the fact that he doesn't want to be with a human. Bah!_

Seeing him again was difficult. The skin had healed, his eyes were clear, but the smile stayed trapped on his lips, he avoided looking at her. Even the knock on the door had been different.

- _knock knock_-  
And that was that. No steady thumping of knuckles three times or a little tattoo against the wood as a secret signal. And then there was the cold. He radiated cold, as though his flesh had been frozen.

It was awkward, all of it. Beth explained about Cal's meagre testimony; they were moving him into witness protection on the east coast. For now he was under psychiatric observation. Cassie's death had devastated him; Cal's parents stayed with him round the clock. Mick told her he knew, he'd been there himself. Thank God Cal had been half-out of it with pain. All he remembered was Mick pulling the two men away from him.

They danced around each other, careful not to invoke memories of the last time they'd been in the living room together. It hadn't even been a week and already they were acting like they had several months to catch up on. Both avoided the couch. She was restless and moved around, shifting from position to position, room to room. Beth finally ended up in front of the computer, he sprawled on a chair across the room from her. This was better, easier.

It was as if all the intimacy that had so spontaneously sprung up between them had vanished overnight. They were on opposite ends of the room, they didn't touch, they avoided looking at each other. And yet, each gazed at an undefined point with such intensity that the other was left in no doubt as to just how aware they were of each other. This was ridiculous, like a game that old divorced couples have to play at their children's weddings. How many times in the last three weeks had they ended up with this stalemate only to have the tension crack in a way that was unacceptable...and then they'd go back to being semi-strangers again, unwilling to discuss anything.

He knew she wanted to talk about the almost-feeding. Well, he really didn't want to think about dying again; he wanted to talk about the almost-sex. Neither of them was going to initiate it, which was probably a good thing. Yet the strain hung in the air between them. It was difficult to push away someone that had become so important in so short a time.

_Why are still doing this to ourselves? Why do I keep putting myself through this torture? Much better to just leave things be, avoid each other and let things settle. That was the original game plan, St John and a bloody fantastic one it was. Too bad your vaunted self-control chose right now to break. _He hadn't stood a chance, though. He'd watched her walk up the stairs one morning in his shirt, like she belonged, and that was it. Right now, Mick needed her help so if he could play it cool, it would be fine. _If I let it go for long enough, eventually this will either wear off or I'll be able to hide it better. Beth and Josh will probably be fine or break up, whichever way I don't care what happens to Josh. Beth, thank you for saving my life, now get the hell out of it. I can't sleep, I can't eat, all I do is crave you. A child died because of you and me._ Not that she needed to know that. It wasn't her fault...

His face was half in shadow; the night seemed determined to make her notice him. Cleft in his chin, the long lashes that caught the light. Beth thought ruefully of the mascara she'd been stocking up on since she was fourteen. _All I do is suppress this...these...urges. How can I when I can see is the swell of his chest under his shirt and remember how it feels to touch? His legs are hair-roughened and long, he moves with his whole body._ Beth looked away from the painting she had been staring at and straight at him. He was studying the vial. _His hands_ - she swallowed thickly - _those hands_. Long fingers, so delicate for such strength, large enough to cover a breast and gentle enough to coax her to screaming orgasm with a few soft caresses.

She was just fast enough. Her eyes dropped as his rose and she knew, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that he'd see the flush on her face, hear her heartbeat and smell whatever she was feeling. What was it that men did when they controlled arousal? Josh had laughingly told her once, _Think of something that turns you off...take a cold shower in your head._

"So, why did you take Coraline's blood?"  
He didn't seem fazed but he had that bloody half-smile. "Answers. I think it might be the key to the cure."

--

**Three hours later...**

"...Josh looked like he'd come off worst in a fight with a pencil sharpener."

"My buddy - always with a kind word for the boyfriend of the human he's trying to seduce."

There was silence from Mick's end.

"What, no comeback? No snappy remark about not trying to seduce her?" Josef raised his eyebrows in mock surprise.

"I'm not trying to seduce her." The voice was only slightly off.

"Yeah and why not?" Josef asked exasperatedly. "What's the deal with you and blondie? You're willing, she's willing, seems like such a waste to me. Surely youcan leave off being a brooding monster long enough to let -" he gestured indulgently, " - little Frankenstein out to play?"

"We're friends, OK? She's swayed by the whole immortal part of it, but I doubt she's seriously willing." _Change the goddamned topic!_

"Mick, it pains me to have to do this. The episode I am going to reference should be burned into your brain, given that it's probably the most action you've seen in twenty years, but I distinctly remember you mentioning something about Beth, vampire blood and needing to take a cold shower. She's willing all right."

Mick's voice was quiet and firm, "I won't do that to her. And it would never work."

_Broken record..._"There's a big surprise. You know, you can still do the dirty without having the emotional link fall into place if you're careful."

"I know."

"What - did you ask her nicely and she turned you down or something?"

Mick winced. "Just trust me, she's not." He took a quick breath and made up his mind, "And she made a somewhat informed decision."

Two hundred years of suave bearing helped Josef avoid choking on the scotch. _Informed?_ "My my, so Little Frankie..." Then he stopped, his words drying up at the look on Mick's face. _Oh Christ, not again._ "Hey man, what happened?" Josef asked gently.

And there it was, that special tone that Josef used when he was trying to be a good friend. Mick stretched out one leg, draping it over the arm of the chair.

"We...had a slight lapse in judgement and then thought better of it."

"Slight lapse in judgement as in you told her how you felt or you kissed her?"

Lately it was like he was confessing to everyone. Well, exercise wasn't helping the delirium, maybe a sharp smack upside the head from his best friend would. "I stayed the night."

Josef set the glass down quietly. "I know you, I know it would have been consensual in every way, so what happened?"

"She- _We_ thought better of it the next morning."

"You _both_ thought better of it?"

_Motherf-..._ of course Josef would pick up on that. "Yeah."

"She thought better of it. She made a _choice_?"

"Yeah." The bloody whiskey glowed almost black at this angle, like crushed roses.

"So you didn't actually fuck her, did you?" Josef asked softly. He watched as Mick's entire body stiffened, head snapping up to stare at him.

"Don't push me."

"Sorry." Josef held up a hand. "I'm just surprised. You're a strange man, my friend." He took a long swallow.

Mick shifted in his chair then looked up to see...was that pity? Oh no, not from Josef, no way! That would make this so humiliating....He started to smile from the sheer dramatic nature of it all. "This is so pathetic," he ground out between the laughter that was threatening to choke him.

Josef's solemn expression broke slightly. "You _are_ the most pathetic vampire I know. I'm rescinding on our B.F.S. pact."

"B.F._F._," Mick corrected

Then the room was filled with the rare sound of two vampires snorting hysterically into glasses of whiskey and blood.

"What the hell, Josef." Mick was the first to recover. "Where did you learn these words?"

"I peeked in one of Ryder's chat conversations and for a second I thought he was corresponding in cipher. Turns out that language has changed a lot in the last fifty years when I wasn't looking. So he gave me a short, informative presentation."

"Figures."

Mick stood up and put the half-full glass down. "I have some work to catch up on. Thanks, bro."

"At least finish the glass!"

"Since when do you care if I leave a glass half-finished?

Josef looked pained. "It's a Macallan Fine and Rare, you...!"

Mick's raised an eyebrow. "Why didn't you tell me? In that case..." He swallowed the contents in a large gulp and closed his eyes as the familiar burning spread itself through his body.

Josef still looked pained. No, actually he looked downright shell-shocked.

Mick nodded at Josef and walked towards the door.

"Peasant." The word floated softly out towards Mick on waves of amusement and disgust. He grinned and pulled the door closed behind him.

He left, almost light-hearted.


	24. Chapter 24

AN: I keep meaning to reply to all the comments individually but there just doesn't seem to be enough time in the day. I apologize for that but 'thank you' to everyone who reads and comments. It makes my day when I see an email from [I'm easily pleased...heh]. So thank you, everyone. And just to re-state, if you have any questions or concrit, please let me know.

--

Errands cannot run themselves, more's the pity. Paying the Cleaner had been - not fun, to say the least. She was appreciative of the generous tip, but shook her head at Mick's stupidity; the disapproval was almost annoyingly intimidating. At least Errand One was accomplished. Errand Two was trickier. There was no way Marco was going to let him wander in and out quickly.

LA was a rotten town for walking, but when you have implausible reserves of energy and celerity, that doesn't matter very much. The familiar smog hung like lead in the air - huh, smog that smelled of fried chicken. Mick chucked to himself. Breathing in other peoples' dinners was the closest a vampire came to actually tasting food again, and it wasn't a half-bad experience. He could smell that the chicken had been fried in lard with a hint of butter. There was goulash brewing across the street; Chinese take away, greasy burgers even? The burger family was arguing over the remote.

The front view of the jewellry store showed it to be sprightly but a bit faded, an immaculate coat of paint serving only to highlight the disarray surrounding it; West Hollywood had really hit the skids. The alley smelled of vampires and cats piss; he looked around carefully. Marco was expecting him and should be waiting. Mick reached the unmarked door without smelling anyone or anything out of place. He checked his watch, five minutes early. That gave him ten minutes; Marco was always five minutes late. They'd beaten the half an hour tardiness out of Marco eventually. There'd been a lot of protests but the young vampire had adjusted. Besides, Josef didn't ask nicely more than once and everyone knew Mick was only good for one round of protecting unless he _really_ liked you.

"You gonna stand there like a roosting bat all day or you comin' in?"

_Damn, the kid was getting better all the time!_ Mick's eyes shot up towards the inky blackness above him, yes, there it was, the shape of an open window and the white sleeves gave Marco away immediately. The quick leap took all of a second, although he did misjudge the angle and depth slightly and grazed a foot against the sill.

Marco laughed delightedly to see him and hugged him tight. "Clumsier and clumsier, Mick. You probably burned all the brain cells you had along with the rest of you. You didn't even smell me!"

Mick smiled broadly in return, watching the brown eyes dance. "I was expecting to be kept waiting. Did someone tan your hide again?"

"Oh please," she offered, rolling her eyes, "like I'd let any of you ever get the chance again."

He merely shook his head, still smiling, preferring not to be caught in a verbal joust.

There was a quick stamp on the ceiling and then raucous laughter exploded through the wooden planks. Laughter and - there was that smell again, only without the lard, butter or frying this time.

"Chickens?" he asked incredulously.

Marco huffed, "Cock fighting, _scemo_! Traditional Italian gambling. You should know, it was damned popular in Ireland."

"Must have missed that somehow," he retorted sweetly, "growing up in LA."

The rooms around them were dimly-lit. The thin, tall building was set up like an old brownstone; long, narrow corridors branched off haphazardly into rooms of varying sizes. Marco led him to the jewellry den in the back, through a beaded curtain of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. _That's new!_ Mick parted it around Jesus' eyes and, with difficulty, refrained from commenting.

"Anything interesting come up yet?" he asked, sliding a manila envelope out of his overcoat and onto a nearby table.

"No." Marco shook her head for good measure, engrossed in digging through the drawers at her work station. The rustling of the envelope startled her momentarily and she glanced at Mick - she always did, looking for the pity or the unspoken recrimination - but there was nothing but professional courtesy on his face. He understood better than anyone, after all.

"Got it!" she muttered triumphantly after a few seconds. "The pendant is soldered onto the chain now so you won't lose it. I had to re-work the design slightly and clean off the blood. I don't know what you were doing but the poor thing's really been battered around. Not surprising, given your penchant for trouble."

"Thanks." Mick slipped the chain out of the plastic package and looped it around his neck again.

"Fleury Cross." Marco nodded to the pendant embossed with four fleur de lis. "French. Why do you wear it?" She knew the answer but with Mick sometimes you could never tell.

"Coraline picked it out." He shot Marco a warning glance and sighed as the impish smile crept back. "Have you heard anything about it, Marco?"

"Nothing." She gestured to the chair opposite her

"You can open it," Mick said gently, watching her stroke her fingers across the envelope he'd left there

"It's OK. I'll do my 'informant' thing first, shall I?

"OK. Coraline's death at the hospital - ask around. It doesn't make sense. What was a vamp was doing looking for her in the hospital. How did they even know it was her? Even I didn't know till that night. I want to know where Mattola is as well. He can't have vanished all that quickly. Two is the usual - anything I might need to know about. Three," and his voice hardened, "how'd you hear about my getting burned?"

"One, as I said, nothing on Coraline or Mattola, but I'll keep asking." She tapped a finger against her lips, "Next week we're setting up as an opium den. I can try again, see how it goes." She laughed out loud at his expression, "What, Mick? It's an underground club. You didn't think I'd settled on cockfighting permanently?

He gave her one of his sarcastic half-smiles. "No. Go on."

"You should visit more often," she said quietly. Then her tone changed back to brisk and business-like. "Two, no new atrocities to report. There is the usual hunt n' drain on occasion. And no, Mick, you know that's Cleaner business. Stop trying to save every mortal. Three, I heard that the new Cleaner working shifts seems to be a fan of yours. Josef sort of suggested that might be because she got to put you to bed the other night. He was kind enough to explain why."

Mick shrugged in response. "I suppose I shouldn't be surprised."

She straightened a sleeve delicately. "You shouldn't, but then you're always wishing for the impossible."

"So, you have nothing for me right now?" he asked abruptly, trying to get the conversation back to an even keel.

Marco's face tightened and she raised one black brow accusingly. "You're really wound up tonight. What'd you do - proposition Beth and have her turn you down?"

_For fuck's sake - what was it with everyone picking on that tonight!_? "Cute, but no."

"Want a drink?" she asked finally, moving to the fridge. "It's been about two months."

"Not tonight. I have some things to do in the morning and I should probably get some freezer time before then.

"Morning? Is this Beth again?"

"Yeah." He didn't want to explain the vial or the cure or Coraline. More urgently, he didn't want to see the hope flaring in her eyes to match the need in his. _Vampires like me._ Of all the vamps in LA, Marco was the only one as desperate as he was to be mortal again. She had three reasons and their names were Raul, Sofia and Beatrice.

"You know the fleurdeliser was used to brand criminals?"

AB- scented the air and Mick felt his mouth start to water slightly. "Yeah, I read 'The Three Musketeers' too."

"Why do you still wear it?"

"Albatross round my neck?" Mick offered with a wink as he stood up.

She looked a lot older than forty-two suddenly, as if the thirty-six years that vampirism had held in limbo came flooding back. He should be grateful, leaving his family had been hard enough, leaving three children because a hunting pack had accidentally Turned the main course at dinner...

"They're fine, they're happy." Reassuring her, not that she needed it, that's what the photographs were for.

She looked up, smiling again, and followed him out of the room. "I should get back upstairs. Patricia can only hold them at bay so long."

"Yeah, all those cocks and only the two of you."

_Bastard!_ She'd walked right into that one and the way Mick relished the words told her he enjoyed doling out payback. _Probably for that crack about propositioning Beth._ She stuck her tongue out at Mick's back as he slid out the window.

-

It felt strange to be in the freezer before dawn, but his days and nights had been a jumbled mess for months now. Every so often he'd painstakingly force routine and normalcy onto his life again, and then something would happen to shake him from his complacency. Nothing had been the same since Beth saw him. But some things went deeper than he could control.

_The pendant was a wedding present, now it's more of an ingrained habit like most things in my life. Morals and scruples for a tenuously reformed vampire is a huge joke to most, but I'm almost OK with that. I don't want to take the chain off, it won't change anything. As Josef says, symbolism is only what you make of it, although he doesn't seem to have taken his own advice with Sarah's necklace. What is it with older vamps and belling their mates?_

Mick felt the cold seep into him, the quiet hum of the fan under him the only sound reminiscent of a heartbeat. He thought of the vial and his shoulders tightened. Since New York, he'd spent more time wondering and worrying than sleeping.

_Coraline liked playing with my head; symbols were stock-in-trade for her. She liked the cyclical nature of time, the way the past haunted one. I lacked that delicacy of touch; I enjoyed fucking with her life - the incessant arguments, coming and going whenever I pleased, tormenting her with other women. I should mourn her. I've been mourning her for twenty-three years. Maybe there is no more mourning left. _

Sleep was elusive again. Part of him was still burning with shame over the Cleaner and Beth and the fact that it wasn't his job driving his life anymore. It was – Mick shifted restlessly – uncomfortably close to Coraline. Coraline, who came, saw and consquered, and then vanished. There was a part of the world that was a little more dazed and dark when she wasn't there; it had been inconceivable that something so.... Mick fought for words: strong, poisonous, potent, bright? Beth had been worming her way into that part of his world.

_Josef understands sometimes. He understands mourning, he understands the regret. He doesn't understand my addiction to Beth. I don't get his thing for Sarah though. What the hell did he see in a mortal woman in the 50's? I fucked a lot of them and man, they were boring. _

They'd had this conversation a couple months ago, sober unfortunately:

_"Look, I'm aware that I've broken our cardinal rule in the past and you haven't wanted to hear it. I'm going to do it again. I understand that Beth's gotten to you. _

_I see it, man. She's pretty, she's bright...for food. But compared to vampires? Kind calls to kind, Mick, even you know that."  
_

_What the fuck is he talking about? Startled by the fact that Josef couldn't seem to stay hands-off when it came to this.  
_

_"You've put Blondie on a pedestal. For some reason she's like your personal mascot for how you should live your life. You weren't born then, but let me tell you, the art of 'courtly love' had nothing on you.'  
_

_"You finished?" I don't believe this.  
_

_"If she'd been anyone else but that child, you'd have walked past her that night and never bothered to pay attention. This practice of letting mortals into our world and then treating them as equals has got to stop, unless you can control her or turn her."  
_

_"There's an idea. I should now bring the unworthy mortal into the fold? She's saved me twice already; I fed from her. I think I can safely drop the paranoid bullshit."  
_

_"Next you'll be telling me I'm a hypocrite, Mick, and that I don't understand love."  
_

_Sighing. "I'm not in love..."  
_

_"Really? And what do you know about love? You murdered the last woman you fell in love with because you weren't ready for who she was. Then you spent twenty-odd years as a fucking Boy Scout, only to have some remnant from your past waltz back into your life and suddenly your head doesn't seem to be catching all that much bagged blood."  
_

_Stopping. Changing the subject. Burying the hatchet. What's the point of fighting? Eternity is a long time to hold a grudge._

Most tellingly, Mick was primarily confused, and that was a feeling he didn't often grapple with. He enjoyed his purposefully simplistic view of life, the made-up rules he set for himself were reminiscent of being human and constrained by mortality and time. It felt right and he was too old to care what anyone else thought of his decisions. Josef had called him on that too, with the Lee Jay fiasco. Would he have seen Beth if she hadn't been Beth? But then she wouldn't have been Beth. The thought chased itself around his thoughts until his eyes finally closed.


	25. Chapter 25

Beth barely heard the door shut behind Mick, all her attention focused instead on the dishevelled man slumping onto the couch. For a second she thought wildly that he'd been in a fight, but Josh never got into fights! The reality was much, much worse.

"You've been marked," Josh was saying bluntly. "They'll come after you."

The photograph was recent, she recognised it from a few days ago; she'd been walking out of BuzzWire when it was taken. How could they possibly have they known to keep her under surveillance? _My God, Cal._ Josh and the DEA had made no secret of their connection to that case.

Marked? Like that pregnant girl - _what was her name?_ - that they had shot in Inglewood just for helping Cal. Beth felt the bile rise in her throat; they would enjoy the killing. She clutched the photograph so tight the edges buckled between her fingers.

"Beth?" He wasn't sure how to approach this, wasn't sure of what she'd say, if she'd rage at him or worse, kick him out.

"How did you get this?" Her eyes were wide and staring

He spoke painfully and slowly. "We brought Tejada in for questioning. Offered him a deal to see if he would crack. He didn't; we knew he wouldn't. I told him we were filing charges tomorrow." A pause. "I was attacked in the parking lot on my way home. That's a warning.

"Oh my God, are you hurt? Do we need to call a doctor?" Beth moved as if to touch him, but she couldn't make her hands let go

"No, I'm fine. They didn't hurt me, just bruises." Josh leaned forward gingerly to take the photograph from her

"They're going to use me to get to you?

"I recused myself," he repeated. "I just didn't think it would get this bad.

Comprehension dawned, finally - the reason he looked guilty as well as defeated. "You knew about this? That they hunt women?

She watched his head fall as he struggled for the words, "You saw Cassie.... I swear, I swear, I didn't think they would...Beth, I had no idea they knew about you. I was ready for them to come after me."

_Cassie, that's the name._ She stood up and walked away. _Wasn't Coraline enough?_

Josh looked around tiredly - the apartment was spotless as usual. It was as if Mick had never been there. _What do they do together, Beth and Mick? Not even a glass is out of place._

He went to wash his face.

When Josh looked up from the basin, Beth was standing there again and she was in a crusading mood.

"You can't recuse yourself from the trial, it gives out the message that the DA's intimidated."

She was fighting him now, pushing the point. He knew the arguments, he'd used them himself with reluctant witnesses. But he hadn't even considered the cost to Beth until Carl had brought it up - how could he have been so blind? He knew the dangers, he'd just pushed it to another part of his consciousness, hadn't wanted to think about it. This case was so big it would explode all over the news, it was an ADA's wet dream. He didn't _want_ to step down.

Beth was furious. The anger poured out of her searching for a target. She veered delicately away from using Josh as one, but couldn't settle down enough to find another. Somehow she knew vaguely that it should be HEM, but that wasn't why she was angry. She focused on Josh's decision instead. She'd been angry all evening - would they both always let her down this way? They had roles that they were supposed to keep to. How else was she meant to keep them apart and on equal footing? One was meant to guard her from all harm but hurt her badly instead. The other was supposed to complete her but failed; instead he guarded her and their relationship like some sort of grail.

"Look, if you recuse yourself and the case fails and then Tejada goes on to kill someone else's brother or wife or daughter.... You have to stay on this case, it's the right thing to do."

Right and wrong. It was laughable that it was coming out her mouth. _Sinless in thyself, huh? What were __you__ doing three nights ago? Whose fingers were you_ _clenching around? Forgetting so fast?_ She couldn't let him give this up for her, not when she couldn't give up her desires for him. Equal footing.

He'd forgotten how passionate she got about justice and truth. It was almost funny coming from someone who worked for a media outlet that specialized in sleaze. He'd said that once to her and she hadn't appreciated the observation. He searched her face carefully, eyes grazing the set pout of her lips and the firmness in her demeanour. The intensity felt real, directed solely at him, and it had been so long since Beth had looked at him like that. She'd come back from New York an emotional wreck and she hadn't let him touch her since that case with the Inglewood boy. But there was fire in her eyes now and he couldn't help the reaction.

She pulled away from the kiss a few times to look at him. He never knew what she was thinking when she did that, but he could see there was a decision of some kind being made. Josh didn't care at this point, he only knew he had to meet that passion he'd glimpsed, stoke it so that it never went away again. At some point the decision-making ended and she stopped opening her eyes to stare at him.

They tumbled towards the bed.

--

_It is the thing and the whole thing in itself. If it makes no sense, I don't care - I'm not even supposed to be thinking right now. But it is the thing and the whole thing - source and sustenance, question and answer, torment and soothing. Every thrust is different, varied. I feel the microscopic changes because they echo in my body. There, that string of fire linking my lower back to the pleasure is a particularly hard thrust. This moan is the submission of my mouth to his. These hands are not so large, not so strong, but infinitely more familiar and comforting. This weight, my legs fit perfectly around these hips. There is a spot I want him to reach, angled high on the inside wall. There - yes! He hasn't forgotten and I almost cry with relief. Josh mistakes this for passion and pushes harder. I push back against him, but this time, ironically, it means we are working together. Towards a single goal. Is that true? Or does it mean we are both using each other to get somewhere? Two separate goals and one single process? I try to ignore this, concentrate on the breathing, the slow flutter of his hair against my cheek as he slides past and then back. Smooth face - no stubble? - strong arms. He hasn't forgotten - had I?_

_This odd, rasping noise is coming from me. I sound like an aeroplane taking off from LAX on it's way East. Josh is staring, still moving, his face approaching and retreating rhythmically. I remember screaming the last time - must even the score in Josh's favour. Thrusting faster now. I pushed one man away today to make room for another. I pushed the guilt away to say thank you for a sacrifice. He pushed his needs away for my safety - reciprocity. Reciprocity is love. One of them hasn't recip... - he only pushed me away._

_So close, losing thread of coherent. Not the same. Forgive me. Shouldn't feel pleasure again but do. Oh, I do...don't stop. Don't stop and take my mind with you._


	26. Chapter 26

Morning dawned in a haze of exhaust fumes and blue skies. It was ironic that he lived so close to the tropics, considering he'd almost died from twelve minutes of sun exposure a couple days ago. If he moved now it would be north. Mick remembered the lonely walk through the streets of New York. The jacket had just been a sop to convention; he had revelled in the wind tunnels, feeling the cold soothe the worst of the hurt. OK, dinner and then he'd have more than enough time to make it over to Bionalysis by ten. He blew out a long sigh and headed downstairs.

Eight-thirty in the morning; he'd gotten four and a half hours sleep. Enough to keep him going till the early afternoon at least. He still needed to be careful, his body was recovering from the huge effort of re-growing layers of charred skin and muscle. Nothing new on BuzzWire. He switched to CNN but sighed when he saw the election coverage; it seemed pretty pointless to make promises with a shelf-life of four years only. Mick switched back to BuzzWire without thinking, scanning the updates over the last few hours. Beth hadn't been out last night, he knew that, so what was he looking for? He turned the TV off and tried to think of something else.

What was it Marco had said? _The new Cleaner seems to be a fan of yours._ He couldn't help the smug grin; it was so unusual for a Cleaner to be approachable in any way. Of course, this one was new - trained, but only hitting two hundred. Coraline had been a little over two hundred when they'd met. Maybe you had to be of a certain age. He laughed shortly. _Ain't that the truth!_ But it had always been that way. The mothers indulged him even as he took the daughters dancing and parking.

Then shied away from the thoughts. He'd felt guilty about that for almost half a century, what was different this morning? _Sex._ The initial sting of rejection had lessened, he'd gone back to hoarding the pain inside himself, but his body wasn't ready to starve itself again. Twenty years of watching freshies saunter by, cold showers, twenty years of professionalism and will crumbled under six months of a slow awakening. _Undead but not dead. Damn her!_ He growled softly.

One tentative hand went down to where he could feel himself grow hard. It was like being twelve all over again and learning what his body wanted for the first time. Mick closed his eyes, jaw tightening. _Shouldn't give in._ A shower could always take care of this. His fingers slipped past the waistband of the pyjamas.

Three minutes later,Mick hunched over his desk, fangs buried into his forearm and shuddered out the pent-up frustration. _What a mess. But better, much better._ His eyes opened and the world around him stabilized again. Marco had told him of her Turning, that it was as if God had turned his face away, and you went searching and crying for him, but every step closer to what you thought was spiritual was another piece of your soul ripped away. It struck him as a good metaphor for love too - soul ripped away. He stood up slowly and went to get dressed.

--

**10:20am**  
Mick only waited twenty minutes before he walked into the lab. He contemplated calling Beth, but it would just prolong the delay. After fifty-five years, you'd think another lousy twenty minutes or so wouldn't be asking much, but it was. This way, he just took matters into his own hands.

--

**11:07**  
It was only when she opened the door wearing a T-shirt that barely covered her ass that Mick _knew_ something was wrong. Beth had never stood him up before, she was too conscientious as a rule. But the woman in the doorway wasn't imbued with her usual professional poise; she was more flustered than he'd ever seen her before, and he wondered what was wrong. His eyes started at her bare feet and moved up, almost uncomprehendingly.

Beth tugged at the shirt as if she could lengthen it through sheer embarrassment. "What time is it?"

She didn't even know or she didn't care?

The apology was half-garbled, she was so emphatic. The sincerity should have been a consolation, instead Mick found himself puzzled. _Fear? Distinct smell of something like fear at least. She's worried? About standing me up?_ He half-smiled and let go the annoyance. He'd already handed the vial in.

Josh's voice sounded in the background just as Mick opened his mouth to ask if she was alright.

He told himself later that it shouldn't have been a shock, that it shouldn't have felt like a betrayal. But all of a sudden he had a very clear idea of what Beth had meant that night in his apartment when she had turned to him and cried, "How could you?" as Coraline flaunted herself on his staircase. He, of course, had no right to make the same claim.

There was no smug wave this time; Josh didn't seem to notice him. The words 'TAC squad' caught him like a physical blow.

"TAC squad? Somebody needs police protection?" He felt Beth's pulse speed up.

"Yes," she replied finally. "Me."

Of course he came in.

**11:14**  
It wasn't a satisfying explanation, but Josh told him anyway. Sometimes the universe is tricky like that – divergent strands come together at the most ludicrous moments. HEM was back in his life, only this time their target was something infinitely more precious to him.

"I'd appreciate it if you kept an eye on her until the TAC squad gets in place," Josh said.

What else was there to say but yes. _He's not asking, he's acknowledging. We both have our own ways of keeping her safe. _And of the two of them, Mick was the only one who had already faced HEM down successfully.

**11:26**  
Beth walked tentatively up to Mick as he was finishing a sweep of her bedroom.

_Glass window, fire escape outside, metal so you might hear footsteps echo. Can't see in well from across the street - blind angles._ He looked out just in case there were any lurkers in the vicinity.

"Thank you for doing this," she said from behind him.

He half-turned, his hand still blocking most of the sunlight streaming in. "Don't go near the windows, keep them covered. Try to avoid casting a shadow against the blinds and curtains. You'll be fine during the day, just be careful at night."

"OK." Beth fidgeted slightly in place, waiting for him to finish.

"What happens now?" Mick asked finally, drawing the blinds.

"What?"

"What do you need to get done today?"

Beth shrugged. "Um, nothing. Maureen knows about- this. I'm her main story, sort of. As long as I don't get killed." She laughed nervously for a moment. "So, I'm off till the TAC squad gets here tomorrow."

Mick nodded. "OK. What time does Josh get back?

"I don't know," she said. "He's going out with Carl to arrest Tejada as soon as the warrant comes in, but they're not expecting it till later this evening. Why?"

Mick moved away from the window and nodded towards the living room. "Let's sit down. You look tired," he said, noting her strained features. He claimed the detested couch this time; it was the only piece of furniture that faced away from the window. Beth curled up in a chair opposite him.

"I'm sorry about this morning," she started hesitantly.

"Don't be," he said unemotionally. "It's OK. It's the afternoon I'm worried about."

"I need to sleep," Mick continued, in response to the unasked question she shot at him. "I'm still...recovering from the sunburn."

She nodded and stood up. "You need to go back to your apartment then. I'll grab some things." Beth stopped short at the look on his face. "Oh. Should I not-"

"No," he said quickly, "You should. I'm just amazed I didn't have to argue."

"I've seen what they do to women; I'm not stupid. The most merciful death I could hope for is a quick one with a bullet in my head."

He found himself stalking towards her, eyes fixed on hers. Mick only stopped when she backed up slightly against the armchair. _Don't push it, St John._

"Nothing is gonna happen to you, OK?" he said gently, taking her hands in his. "You'll be indoors all day. My place is safe." He grinned slightly as she attempted a disbelieving stare, "OK, maybe not vampire-proof, but unless they're coming after you with anti-ballistic missiles and grenades, you'll be fine.

Beth pulled her hands away and smiled hastily. "It's a good thing I got you around. I'll be right back."

Mick let her go reluctantly. All vampires missed the warmth of human bodies. There was something unbearably erotic about feeling warmth pulsing under your fingers again, and something unbearably tragic too. He'd seen the damage that feral vampires did to their victims - some of it was bloodlust, some of it just untrammeled rage because what they craved so intrinsically could only be experienced second-hand.

"You ready?" he asked as Beth walked back into sight.

--

**12:13**  
The strain finally evaporated as they pulled away from the kerb. He'd hustled her out of the house, all senses on alert, covering her with his body.

Beth let out the breath she had been holding and relaxed against the seat. Mick kept his eyes on the road, but couldn't stop the smile tilting the corners of his lips.

She glared at Mick, half-annoyed and half-amused. _Oh I know you know. And I'm pretty sure that you know I know. But do you know if I care whether you know I know you know?_ Then shook her head admonishingly as his smile widened.

"And what are you grinning about?" she asked, slightly nettled at how easily he could read her.

He smelled the blush before it happened. "You look like you've just made another successful getaway from the scene of a crime." Mick stopped smoothly at the amber light, finally turning to face her.

"I've never committed a crime!" Beth denied hotly. "OK, maybe some breaking and entering, and the occasional masquerade as someone I'm not, but that's all part of my _job_. And if we're talking criminal offences Mr. 'No, I swear I was born in 1978, Officer'..."

The blush had deepened with her impassioned defence and his mouth watered suddenly, instinctively. Almost as quickly as it had sprung forth, the hunger was beaten into submission by a wave of self-loathing.

Beth looked over and saw his mouth twist, as if he was fighting something. One eyebrow arched smoothly at him and she was delighted to see the ghostly flicker of movement behind his sunglasses - she'd been practicing that gesture for a while now.

"Do you need anything before we get to the apartment?" Mick asked stiffly. S_till nothing in the rearview mirror - good_

"Food might be nice.

"OK."

--

**6:01**  
Mick came downstairs at twilight to find Beth dozing on the couch. It was a physical relief to move past her and into the kitchen. As a human, he could have pretended that she wasn't there, as a vampire he was all too aware of her.

The cold had eased some of the remnant kinks in his muscles; another two feedings and he'd be good as new. Which was funny because large parts of him would be just that. Beth stirred slightly behind him as he paused before the blood compartment.

_Drink or injection?_ She was waking up, and in spite of everything, he didn't want to feed in front of her. _Syringe it is_. The A+ pulled reluctantly into the glass barrel. Mick had half the contents emptied into his veins when she woke up, but it was too late to stop now. The syringe clattered slightly as he dropped it back onto the counter and braced himself with a gasp for the rush - fangs extending, eyes flushing, the throbbing sensation of heat.

"Mick?

_Two seconds more. Should be sitting down - easier._ He groaned as the last of the buzz wore off, and turned just in time to intercept the hand that reached out to him

"Don't ever touch a vampire when they're feeding." It wasn't exactly appropriate as an opening line, given that she didn't know what he was doing, but facts are facts

Beth glanced down and saw the empty vial and the syringe. "Oh," she breathed. "I didn't know. I heard you moan; I thought something was wrong."

"It's OK." He took both instruments over to the sink and rinsed them out.

Beth frowned as he set the sterilizer. "You can't catch anything."

"Force of habit, I guess."

She smiled a little at this. "Neat freak."

There was something she was bursting to ask him, he could sense it. And wanted nothing to do with it just yet. "I'm going to go shower and change. You should call Josh. See if he knows when he'll be back yet."

In a strange quirk of fate, this time Beth watched him climb the stairs. _Stop. He's clothed, sort of, mostly, why the fuck doesn't he own a full set of pyjamas? I'm going stir-crazy here. Stop. Call Josh. _

She had an answer ready when he came down again. "He's not sure. They're still waiting on the warrant. But there's a surveillance team watching the apartment tonight. They come on duty in about an hour, so you can drop me off and still have your night free.

_Is she out of her mind?_ "Beth, you're much safer here. It's not safe for you to be alone in the house; I'd prefer not to have to stick around to watch the cops watch you."

"I'll be fine. I have your number, and the cops know."

He stared at her in disbelief. "You'd be gone before a cop managed to get his ass off the car seat. You don't have a deadbolt or a good system of locks. You have a fire escape that leads straight to your bedroom window. And you open the door without checking who it is. The apartment is not safe. In fact, it's not safe with Josh there either because you're both targets; he leads them straight to you.

"So, what? I move in with you and you protect me forever?"

They both paused at that. Beth to look shame-faced and Mick to consider the implications of moving far, far away.

She always knew exactly what to say to put him on the defensive. "No. I'll take you back when we have an ETA on Josh getting back. If you need anything I'll be in the office.

"Cases to catch up on?" she asked sarcastically.

"Work, work, work," he called lightly behind him.

--

**8:20**  
She knocked on the connecting door over an hour later. Mick minimized the game of Solitaire quickly.

"Josh called," Beth said, walking past him as he opened the door. "He should be home around eleven or midnight. They've got Tejada; picked him up at his daughter's birthday party apparently."

Mick watched as she sank into a chair on the client's side of the desk. She wasn't going to let him avoid her anymore.

"I'm sorry," she said.

_Opening hand to Beth. Whoever apologises first wins an automatic Get-out-of-Jail-free card._ "So am I."

"We've done this a lot recently." And shook her head.

He sat back down behind the desk and attempted to inject some levity into the situation. "You're stubborn and pushy, so yeah." It only earned him a glare

"I want to go with you tomorrow - to Bionalysis," she said, the statement pitched more like a question.

"I wasn't going to go till you were set up with the TAC team," he said, confused. "I can wait a couple more hours for the results, Beth."

Beth let out a sigh of exasperation. "No, I want to go _with_ you. I can't help much, but this is important to you. I really didn't mean to miss the appointment today. I just got...caught up."

"You don't have to explain."

She winced at the gentleness. "I do. I feel like I do. And this is so _awkward._" Her voice was ragged and harsh.

Mick leaned back in his chair and stared at the desk. "We didn't get a few days apart. It happens. It takes time."

She watched his face but - nothing. It was as though he was inhuman. Well...maybe vampires had preternatural self-control to go with everything else that was so bloody superior about them. "Would you prefer to do it alone?"

"And have nobody to hold my hand when I get the results?" He smiled reassuringly.

They sat in silence for a few moments.

"Did I do the right thing?" she asked suddenly. "I couldn't let him sacrifice the case for me. Not when - I mean, what could I possibly do to reciprocate that? He's given two years of his life to this case; I've only known him for just over a year."

_Careful handling required_, his brain was sending alert signals to his mouth.

"Seems to me that he just wants you to be safe. You can reciprocate by staying alive. And yeah, I think you did the right thing. People like Tejada need to taken out of circulation permanently."

The emphasis on the last word made her shiver. "I don't even want to think about what would happen if Tejada pissed off a vampire."

"He did."

She felt the blush begin at her scalp and wash down her neck at his words.

"But we're not vigilantes out to mop up human mistakes, Beth. The whole organisation needs to be taken down," he continued, eyes followed the strands of expanding blood vessels briefly. "The cops and Josh will do their job. So, when did you first find out about the threat?"

Beth looked at him in surprise, "Last night. When Josh got back. You saw him."

He nodded and went for the kill, "When were you going to tell me?"

"I don't know." Beth felt her stomach plummet. "I didn't really - I mean, I didn't get a chance to think about things." She shifted uncomfortably, knowing he had smelled what had happened. "We argued about it. It was a long night."

It was a conversation within a conversation suddenly. Mick started first.

_Was it good?_ "I'm sorry you had a rough night."

_It wasn't the same._ "It was OK - once I made him see reason."

_It'll never be the same again._ "It's good you were able to work things out finally."

_I wanted him. It's been so long since I wanted him._ "Josh knows what he's doing. He knows the case inside-out, and I couldn't let this monster beat the system."

_Don't play this game with me, please._ "I'm intrigued by your definition of monster."

_I remember; I remember, Mick. But I wanted him._ "Drinking blood doesn't make you a monster."

_You nearly passed out from pleasure when I bit into you. Maybe you__ like the monster_. "So you keep telling me."

_This is why it can never work._ "You'd believe me if you just stopped hating yourself long enough to listen."

"Come on," Mick said, rising. "Let's get you fed and then I'll take you home."


	27. Chapter 27

AN: Ah, my lovely readers! Thank you for all the comments. :)

--

One step forward, one step back.

Mick came up the stairs behind her as she dithered on the first landing. He hadn't said much through dinner - Beth found herself being drilled on the case, on evasion techniques and on all the emergency numbers she'd been given. She'd joked that he should get his own three-digit emergency code so she could call him when she was in danger.

"_Just like Batman?" Mick had responded, smiling._

_"Well, Batman had a signal emblazoned across the sky, not a phone line, and second, you'd need to work a bit harder on the playboy image!" Beth had teased him gently._

_His smile stayed fixed. "A few more vices wouldn't hurt, right?"_

_The frustration had been enough to make her wish for sharp, pointy objects._

"Do you want me to go first?" Mick asked mildly.

_Lead on MacDuff, lead on._ And he led her back to where she had started from so that the beginning had become an ending in itself; the circle was still Beth and Josh but that jagged, ugly, rent opening in the circumference was Mick.

Beth wiped her hands against her jeans before reaching for the key. She gave away too much around Mick, even when she wasn't speaking. Call it pride, self-indulgence, awkwardness – she was tangibly aware of how far from the side-lines of her life he was now. And of what a mess that had made. She didn't want to confess to fear on top of everything else.

He didn't miss the movement. "Josh is home." There was more but she'd find out anyway. It wasn't his secret to give away.

This morning Beth had opened the door and Mick's universe had tilted. Tonight he was willingly ushering her back through the portal. She was going home; it was what he had wanted for her, wasn't it? Josh was waiting to put his hands on Beth's shoulders as she turned to say goodbye. Mick was waiting for the door to close on that grateful smile.

"Remember what I said about the windows."

Josh looked down at Beth, slightly tense. Beth looked up at Mick with inscrutable eyes. "I'm not afraid of monsters."

He stiffened, the growl stuffed hastily back down his throat. "See you tomorrow."

Nods all around in the quiet hallway. Old man wheezing in Apartment 4, cooking from Apartment 7, murmurs filled the sudden silence. Comforting, like chicken soup. Mick could smell the steak inside the apartment, grease coagulating on the cooling meat. He looked back at the couple but no – they still stood out in the tapestry. It's what happened when you cared. Then they became more than the heartbeats, more than the peripherals.

"Thanks, man," Josh was saying.

Mick nodded again and turned to let them close the door. He waited till he heard the lock click and the latch settle into place before heading out. It was like leaving her at the altar.... Time to be going, before he thought of some more ridiculous analogies.

--

"So, you hungry?" Josh asked, smiling as he kissed Beth. She was struggling out of her coat and rolling her eyes as she tried to evade him.

_Octopus hands_, she thought laughingly as she swirled to hang the coat up. "No, I got dinner with Mick. Why?"

His hands fell away. "Right. Of course...I guess you both got hungry just sitting around his apartment." Josh winced at the whinging sarcasm in his voice.

Beth looked around the room. This was the same scene as last night only the roles were reversed. They weren't sitting – that was different. Josh was turning towards the kitchen and he was angry about something, not upset.

"What now, Josh? I can't eat with him?" Beth searched for concern in the room; maybe there would be creases in the sofa where he'd waited, car keys tossed roughly at a table as he called her name through the empty rooms, some clue. This wasn't the same as last night at all.

She followed his angry back. "What's that smell?"

_Long day._ He tried again, ruefully this time. "Sorry, Beth." She didn't take the hand he held out to her. "Long day and I thought you'd wait to get home.... Look, it makes sense. You're with the guy and you're hungry – you eat."

Beth could have kicked herself when she saw the table laid out for two. Candles, wine, flowers, a box of foil containers on the kitchen counter.

"Surprise?" The weak and ineffectual attempt at cheer. Josh adjusted his tie as Beth remained lost for words.

She shook her head in exasperation. "Why didn't you tell me when I called?"

It was Josh's turn to glare at her. "Isn't it obvious? You don't _tell_ people when you want to surprise them. It sort of defeats the purpose, don't you think?"

"You didn't have to tell me _what_ the surprise was! All you had to say was 'Don't eat. Let's have dinner together.' How was I to know you were going to do - all this?"

"'All this'? That's it? That's all you have to say? You know how much trouble I went to to set this up for you?"

Beth walked into the bedroom without a word and tossed her shirt in the direction of the window.

He huffed and started towards it when she threw her bundled-up pair of jeans squarely at him. "Stay away from the windows! Didn't you hear Mick?"

"No," he snapped, throwing the denim back at her and following it across the room. "No, because he didn't _say_ anything!" It fluttered harmlessly at her feet. "Just another coded fucking inside joke of some kind?"

"You can get a clear shot at someone's outline."

She was frightened. What the hell had that bastard put into her head? "Beth." Josh's warm body swallowed up the space between them, inch by gentle inch. "It's OK. Nothing is going to happen to you. I'm here, the cops are outside. It's OK, it's just dinner."

Her right ankle was hooked awkwardly beside his foot. They were so close, so close.

"I just wanted to celebrate," Josh said finally, giving up all pretense. Beth shivered under his fingertips. He looked at her and couldn't help himself. "After last night… the best part of my life came back," he confessed softly. "And since we can't go out to that steak place you've been talking about, I thought that I'd bring it to you."

He couldn't hear her heartbeat. The pads of his fingers only registered tension and muscle mass. He couldn't smell her emotions for clues. How did it ever work among humans? The blind searching for the proverbial needle. Beth stared up at Josh. How did he get it right so often?

"I thought it might make you happy." He sounded defeated. She was doing 'that thing' again. That thing she did when he couldn't read her or do anything right.

Josh almost fell over when her ankle shifted, pulling his leg towards her. Soft arms snaked around his neck.

She saw the shock on his face and it made her want to cry. She'd played them both off against the other for months, trying to keep them apart in her mind and failing. But it was easier not to examine how she felt; it was too easy with Mick's noble intentions and Josh's forgiving indulgence to take what she wanted from both. So it had to stop.

"Last night, huh?" Beth smiled.

"Yeah. In between all the screaming and the moaning, I figured my girl had shown up again." He tried to dodge the light smack to the head but ended up with a throbbing nose and a chestful of flustered, apologetic Beth bearing him backwards to the lit kitchen.

She stood him under the light and snorted. "You're fine. I thought you had a nosebleed."

"You HIT me," Josh protested, somewhat nasally for Beth's benefit.

"Well...you..."

"How about dessert?" He waggled his eyebrows at her, melting when she dipped her head to the side and giggled. "To make it up to me."

"Fine. Only if it's-"

"Cheesecake," he finished smugly.

"I was going to say-"

"Cheesecake! That's what we have."

He ate steak with his tie knotted perfectly and Beth sat across lounging in her underwear and picking at her cheesecake.

She watched him clean his plate with a piece of bread and smiled at how intimate and trusting an action it was.

"Good steak?"

"You're not getting the leftovers. It's mine. Get Mick to find you some food tomorrow." Down went the last of the new potatoes, stray rosemary flecking Josh's plate.

Was this what Mick would be like with steak? Possessive, greedy, teasing.... Beth looked down at her cheesecake, fork prints gouged into the side. Mick stuck a needle in his arm for breakfast; all the visceral pleasure of feeding, and she remembered the pleasure of feeding, eliminated. She looked up and across at Josh's greasy mouth; satisfied grease on a man who neither indulged nor denied himself in either extreme. She didn't feel like a torment and a treasure here, she was just Beth, girlfriend and unappreciative recipient of Josh's humanity.

"What'd you guys eat?" Josh nodded at Beth's plate. "Not even space for cheesecake? Amazing!"

"We got pizza."

Josh's eyebrows flew up. "Pizza? The guy's loaded and he took you out for _pizza_?"

"Actually we ordered in, and what does money have to do with this?"

"Nothing. Just thought, y'know, a nice dinner..."

Beth laid her fork down carefully. "You were angry that I had eaten with Mick. Now you're angry that it wasn't a nice dinner?"

"I'm not angry, Beth."

"Well, you're something!"

They both flashed back to a scene in the hallway at a very different celebration. She saw Josh lose the battle with himself.

"OK, maybe I am angry. He waltzes in here this morning before we're even dressed and then you spend all day with him, _just_ him, while I'm off trying to get the LAPD to pull their fucking fingers out and get the TAC squad in place." Josh leaned half-way over the table, tie dragging in the sauce. "And OK, so maybe nothing happened between you, but he gets to play guardian for you while I'm off pushing paper somewhere to get things done? I mean how long is this gonna keep up? Is he going to be around every time I turn around, like some fucking bodyguard? You _know_ he's in love with you, don't you?"

Beth choked on all the syllables of disconnected words fighting in her throat. There seemed to be no viable beginning. She picked a sound at random. "No."

"Of course, denial. Just like right after he saved you. 'Oh, I need to go to work.' It doesn't matter that you're busy calling out another man's name in our bed."

"It's _my_ bed, Josh. And it's my bed because of bullshit like this. Mick protected me, OK? That's it. I remind him...of someone."

Josh sank back into his chair. "Why won't you move in with me? You're holding out for someone else? Something better?"

"No." This time the syllable rang with conviction. "I'm not holding out for anyone or anything else. I just want to do it for the right reasons."

Josh pushed the flowers out of the way and reached out to grasp her hands. "What is the right reason?"

"I don't know." Beth laughed awkwardly. "When we decide that this is it, maybe? When we're sure. I can't give up my independence without being sure, Josh. I thought you understood that." Josh was smiling at her and she knew that smile. That was the smile Mick gave when he was thinking something he wasn't going to share.

"I do understand that," he replied slowly. "So when we're sure, I guess it'll all happen. I can wait for that." The pressure on her hands increased marginally, warming her skin. "You're worth waiting for."

Not Mick's smile at all then. She felt all the skin flush from her fingertips upwards. "So the TAC squad's going to be here tomorrow?" Beth asked huskily.

Josh's smile widened into a definite smirk. "Yeah, around noon."

"Well, Mick's babysitting me till they get here. I have an errand or two to run, but he's not gonna show till 8:30. So I'd say that we have a few good, uninterrupted hours available." Beth leaned closer, watching Josh's eyes move to her cleavage. "I can think of one thing you don't have to wait for."

He dragged his gaze back up to her face, mouth gaping. "You're going to kill me." And then looked excessively pleased at the thought. "Beth, I can't. I need to sleep before I go before the judge on Tejada's bail tomorrow. And if we start," his eyes twitched lower again, "I'm not gonna be able to stop."

They stood up together, hands still entangled and fingers trembling.

"Listen, it's late, honey," Josh said finally. "Why don't you go to bed? I have a quick call to make and then some documents to finish and I'll be in."

"Don't worry," he whispered as Beth flushed with embarrassment. "We have all the time in the world. Let's get this case over with and take a holiday, huh?"

His phone clattered noisily on the benchtop near the stove.

_Damn._ "Sorry, Beth."

She shook her head consolingly as he walked past.

"Joshua Lindsey. Oh hi....Yeah, look, I'm sorry about that. I was tied up with a case and didn't get a chance to call you. Actually, let me call you back in five minutes, OK? Thanks."

He kissed her goodnight, avoiding her wandering hands.

"Secret witness again?" Beth just had to ask.

"No." Josh grinned. "Just a contact helping out. Now go to bed!"

She caught the faint echoes as he moved out of hearing. "Hello, Celeste. No. I was busy....


	28. Chapter 28

AN: Background, you say? Background? Yes, background. There had to be some. What is a multi-chapter fic without some filling-in-the-past.

--

Across the street, behind the undercover police car, in the shadows between two houses, was a very stiff statue that could only be seen when the moon shone just-so, if you rubbed your eyes furiously and thought of fanciful ghosts. It seemed to be waiting or watching for something.

The cracked leather binding on his lap should have comforted Mick, gold embossing flickering darkly in the glow of the streetlight. Coffee table books, that's what he left in the bookshelves at home. These little ones, well-thumbed, they stayed hidden till he needed them to face the wasteland again.

Twenty years ago things had been a lot worse, but he'd had Beth to fall back on. Thoughts of the cure were ephemeral at best. Mick snorted mirthlessly. They had kept circling each other like polarised magnets - the attraction too strong to push aside, the barriers too strong for any prolonged intimacy. But when she had opened the door earlier that day, Mick had sensed a sudden disconnect, as if she'd gone free-wheeling off far away from him.

Now he had come to find solace in brutal words, and instead found the best part of his denial de-robed and transfixed. Fucking Auden, for having written his evisceration.

_Lay your Sleeping head, my love,  
Human on my faithless arm:  
Time and fevers burn away  
Individual beauty from  
Thoughtful children, and the grave  
Proves the child ephemeral:  
But in my arms till break of day  
Let the living creature lie,  
Mortal, guilty, but to me  
The entirely beautiful.*_

Entirely beautiful. Entirely, agonisingly, redemptively beautiful. And he had delivered her like a sack of groceries to her doorstep and her worried boyfriend.

He was jealous. Not that she had gone back to Lindsey; that choice had been made clear for days now. He was jealous because the validation he had craved, the one that wove into being with a lover, the nonsense reminders with whispered compliments and intimate smiles, wandering hands, that was all Josh's. Beth hadn't pretended to love him for more than the night. Come the daylight and he'd been banished back to his domain.

_Maybe you like the monster._

_1963_

"Sshhh," she whispered.

_Tammy..Candy..Becky...?_ He caught the fresh scent of joss sticks and smiled.

Larger hands enveloped the girl's squat, bare fingers as she fumbled with the key.

"Let me help," he growled in her ear.

She could feel him pressed up against her lower back, one hand on hers, the other moving to her hip to hold her steady. The pressure of his thumbs was doing magical things to her bones...

The door clicked open and the giggling couple spilled inside.

If she had been paying more attention, she'd have noticed the man behind stumbled with all the grace of a falling cat – no hesitation in his movements, cobra-quick.

The bed was functional – a mattress on the floor.

She skipped over to the record player in the corner and giggled some more.

He kicked off his shoes as he watched her bend from the waist over the jumbled stacks of vinyl. Bad girls in tight skirts with firm asses – he could get behind that.

"Do you like this?" she asked finally, straightening up and swaying.

_As a groupie she was a waste_, he thought with disgust. _She missed the goddamn beat._ He pulled her closer and her face flushed. But as food.... Oh yeah. This one was gonna be mind-bending.

His hands moved, well-practiced and silent. Quick flicks and she was rubbing up against him in underwear and stockings. God, he loved stockings. These were the cheap, nylon kind, but they made a woman's legs feel like silk.

She spun around and gasped as he settled her against him, fingers starting to probe. Lips moved to her neck. Normally the half-stoned musicians sat around playing self-serving records while she gyrated to get them hard. This guy had hands that could tame a bear. And he had one sliding in between her legs – _Fuck me, foreplay?_

Out of her league. Out of her mind. _Thank you O divine being of whatever fucking gender. Oh, fuck me. _Twenty and so ephemeral.

She'd ended up the same way as the others. Blindfolded, calling him an animal, squealing with pleasure, gurgling as he drained her, lolling as he pulled out. And he still had no idea what her fucking name was. And suddenly it mattered. Candy, Tammy, Susie, Rachael, Mimi, Debbie...God, there were hundreds of Debbies in the 70s. Not one Beth. He thanked Christ for that. The only Beth was Beth herself. And that memory didn't bleed or end. Not yet anyway.

Oh, what the fuck. Who was he _kidding_? He didn't know anything beyond the fact that Beth had sat in his office a few hours ago and apologised with her blue eyes for sleeping with Josh. She hadn't had to say it. Why had she apologised?

She hadn't told Josh about them. Blanketing the musk was the even stronger smell of relief that made him furious. Cat and mouse - she wanted to bell the cat in warning, but she didn't always want to run when it came ringing. Sometimes she liked playing between its claws. There was only so many times probability would let that pass before an instinct ran away with him.

It was all starting to pile up, one after the other, like a mad race to draw him in all directions at once; he was beginning to feel that the four horses of the apocalypse were rending him apart. _It never rains but it pours, huh?_

Relieved - the way Coraline smelled when he went back to the hospital a second time, without Beth. As though Mick had had a choice; Dr. Duffy had called – the tube was out and she was talking.

He'd had just enough time to get the vial home before leaving to pick up Beth for the last red-eye out.

Mick shifted uncomfortably, his hand moving to smack the leather binding for emphasis. Coraline _had_ been talking the first time, tube and all. He wasn't crazy and it meant _something_.

_I came back for you. I became human for you._

Only the words weren't lulling anymore, they were taunting jabs at his mind. How. How had she dared to reverse the unnatural order of things and become human? How could she take something away from him and then go back to it – just mocking him with her mortality when she knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that he would give hundreds of wives and thousands of Coralines to go back to floral fucking shirts and no money and Sam walking past with that drunken reek.

_I became human for you._ She hadn't known it but that was when everything died. Coraline had put his two obsessions into the same sentence and for the first time he'd realized which one he _needed_. He prayed the vial was safe.

What a fucking mess. Coraline and Debbies and Beth. If he could love Beth, he was doubly damned. He could have, _should_ have, loved the others. Loved them enough to leave them alive at least.

The buzzing in his pocket brought him out of the haze. Mick looked at the screen and sighed – another direction to run. So run he did, at vamp speed, past the police cars and out of hearing.

"Marco."

"She's not dead, Mick."

"Who isn't?"

"The unkillable bitch."

He froze.

"I had a guy here talking about Coraline. Said he'd spotted her a couple days ago."

"Where-"

"He's already gone. I got it second-hand from Patricia. I don't know how I _missed_ it."

Hallelujah! She was back. All he had to do was find her. "Send me whatever you have and name your price for this one – photos, footage, audio, whatever."

"_Price?_This isn't about...how is this possible again, Mick? Who turned her back? Will you tell Josef?"

"It's not his business."

"But-"

"Just send me the information."

"That woman is evil!" He caught the rustle of Venetian sleeves as her fingers snapped instinctively in the familiar pattern: forehead, chest, left, right.

"Way ahead of you there…you've only met her a handful of times. Did Patricia get a name or a reference?"

"Not much." _Scemo._ "She cheats Death too often, Mick."

"Well, let's hope she's around long enough for me to figure out how."

"And I don't have to have met her to see what she's capable of! You're proof enough. And Josef-" It was hard being caught between sires; the words hurried in a tangled mess over the line.

"Josef is not going to be involved in this. Are we clear?"

"You know-"

"Marchellina, stop."

"I am _not_ a new turn anymore, Mick. Don't you take that tone with me!"

"I'll tell Josef myself. But you stay out of it, alright? I don't know what Coraline's doing, but if she's still here then she wants something."

"Or someone."

"Or someone. Leave it alone."

"God himself wouldn't be so merciful."

"Yeah well, he can switch species at will." _A half-forgotten echo in C-minor coloured by fluting voices and swelling gullets: Fidelium animae per misericordiam Dei requiescant in pace.**_

The irony was that Death had cheated them all.

* May the souls of the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace.


	29. Chapter 29

AN: Hooray for comments! I love hearing from all of you. I apologize for not getting back a lot of the time - RL is really busy at the moment. Thanks for reading, as always.

Moving on to the hardest part of the episode for me. I loved the death scenes unequivocally.

--

Gunshots.

That must be stage blood, sweat, urine even, from shock.

There are some memories that are buried beyond the reaches of consciousness. If the last two hundred years of psychology is to be believed, there is more hidden away in mental vaults than we could ever imagine. But there are some memories that stay bright and fresh; it would be kinder if we had a choice.

Beth thought that confronting the past had made her stronger. The woman from the edges of the nightmares – the reason a spider hanging high on the wall made the fear tighten in her spine – was broken. She'd broken Coraline...and Mick and herself. And somehow all of it now made sense. The unerring instinct for the underbelly, the ease with which she moved past Lee Jay and Daniel, Mara whose smiling trust in her had sent her father to prison, even the stifled sounds of an assassin's assassination: she'd been looking for spiders. And she'd broken them all. Humpty-Dumpty Turner. Was it so wrong to want to try again when the shell started to re-knit?

She'd gone looking away from the walls finally, trusting to life and Josh to put her back together, to fix everything and the plagues had ambushed her.

She heard Pestilence in the nine sharp cracks from the front of the car.

The whole world slowed marginally to etch the next moments into her consciousness; soft, ineffable hands cradling her mind like an egg, whispering, "Watch," as the Disease raged in Josh's body, blood pouring like angry armies away from him, the shock of Death on both their faces.

Mick pushed her hand down on Josh's abdomen. She could feel the blood pulsing underneath, pouring into her jacket.

She wanted to press harder but he was in so much pain; she didn't want to hurt him more. But Mick's hand was still over hers and when he pressed harder, she pressed harder. "Keep the pressure on, OK?" Nodding. _I'm so sorry._

She wondered momentarily why Hunger had missed the appointment, then burned as resolute orders were barked across to her.

"Hold him still."

The human body has over a gallon of blood and if you lose more than forty percent of it, you die. Josh wasn't dead, not yet, and she'd be hungry enough for both of them today, hungry just _for_ him. And then she lifted her eyes and realised why Hunger had missed both the humans.

"Take your necklace off." She followed blindly, searching for a reason that Mick would be tightening, pressing, fixing, like a human, instead of lapping at the wounds like a hungry jaguar.

"You learn a lot in war."

_But this is not war! This is just...Josh...in a park..._

"Now this is going to hurt him, so can you hold him still? Be brave, buddy."

"Right." The first words Josh had spoken.

When Mick cut the thigh open, she hadn't been able to look. She'd looked at Josh instead. It was almost worse - she'd been terrified of looking at him. _Half-dead_, the thought crossed her mind and she almost gagged. _Don't you dare jinx this!_

She smiled nervously and tried not to think about the way her face settled into the appropriate creases so easily. This wasn't the first time she'd smiled at a dying man. But the last one hadn't died – he was crouched next to her, hands stringing her necklace through flesh that was meant to be hidden underneath hair and skin.

"Breathe, now!" And she was pressing her lips against Josh's, like she had last night, but different. The familiar touch made her ache. He wasn't responding.

_Breathe my breath. I brought Mick back to life with my blood..._

"Don't leave me. Josh!" Screaming, expelling all that precious air at him.

"Save him please, for me."

Mick refused. The whisper of a breeze through the leaves. The stench of blood. It was just words and sounds after that.

The shrieking of the paddles charging.

"Clear."

Rag doll body bouncing.

"I'm sorry, he's gone."

Death comes to us all. And love, love comes at the strangest times.

--

Mick, with his fingers digging through layers of flesh, bore witness to tenacity of Josh's memories and his heart broke a little more as his resolve faltered a little less: Josh would live. He'd make him live.

_No stranger to grief, am I. No stranger to death or the last, great battle with inevitability. Josh Lindsey didn't know how to curl up and die, but that didn't help him live. Through the battles – bullets and bombings; slow, torturous decimation; fists and feet – the only thing I learned was that victory didn't hide in the strategy charts but in the fragility of human bodies. Live or die? And a little part of the world hung in the balance._

But Nature is more cruel than Vampires. Not that natural creatures see it that way.

He tried to explain: _He's human, Beth. This is what happens._

She wasn't buying it. She wouldn't look at him. He wanted to hold her, check that white tinge on her skin, let her bury her teeth in his neck for vengeance if she wanted...anything but this numbness.

There were so many ways it could have happened and Mick wandered through every possibility searching for the lost crossroad where he had made his first mistake. The fountain? Black Crystal? New York? Leaving her one morning without telling her how he felt? She could have heard him out impassively, drawn back into her comfortable shell of a relationship and told him they were done permanently. That his cherished 'stay' really meant 'fuck me Mick, so we can get this over with and I can get you out of my system.' She'd have had her choice. She made such a big deal about choices, but couldn't she see how it was? When you're faced with inevitability - and it was inevitable that she would run - you don't offer choices. You just sit back and wait for the chaos to abate.

First mistake in the short-term? Not telling her last night that she could take her apology and her lying eyes and shove if it she couldn't take a chance on loving him too. Maybe it was not letting her feed him when he was dying at Inglewood. Maybe he should have just swallowed his pride when she opened the door in Josh's shirt and made his excuses to get the hell out of there. Or done his damn job; let go of the anger and examined the situation carefully. A blind man could see how vulnerable to attack Josh had been. He didn't seem to have any concept of cowering fear. Mick respected that – he'd seen his fair share of cowards.

The stretcher was unnecessarily loud, clacking over stray rocks towards the ambulance. Bustos was being strapped down inside, the bone cracked from a savage blow to the jaw.

Mick glanced towards Beth hunched over by the lake. His hands were still trembling, caked with blood, and the sun was glinting off the muffled sirens. There was a small edge, to the left, just past the clump of bamboo, where the water nestled against the earth. It would take all of three seconds to dip his hands in and wash the blood away. _Who would've thought...._ And he stopped, gasping. _Who would've thought the man to have so much blood in him?_

Fangs itched, his tongue licking frantically at the backs of his lips, whispering to be let out, that it would clean the soiled hands so neatly and so generously. And all the while his own racing heartbeat called up memories of the hunt and the smeared, red badges of victory.

_Not in front of the humans. Not like this._ Beth would see, Beth would know. If he eased Josh's blood from his body to languish forever in the pond, Beth would see, Beth would know what he was trying to do – hide from himself. And from the fact that he was washing Lindsey's insides from his outside and into oblivion, like those of countless other victims.

He moved softly towards the medics who were peering excitedly at Josh under the once-white sheet.

--

Daniels looked curiously from the woman in the spotless shirt to the man standing a few paces behind her. The cops were bustling around; apparently this body was important to them. The woman swayed slightly, he noted with alarm. "Ma'am, are you OK?"

She nodded vaguely, eyes still fixed on the ground, arms wrapped tight around herself. Thomson came round the ambulance, eyebrows raised at the delay. _Just a second._ They had to leave - a man was in critical condition - but there was a hidden undercurrent here that unsettled him.

He felt for the torch in his pocket and walked up to her. "May I look at your eyes, please?" Her dilated pupils didn't even bother following the light - worrying. He pressed his fingers over her wrist: skin still warm; pulse erratic at best, but fairly strong; deep, quiet breathing. Good, she wasn't in medical shock.

The guy behind her was cleaning his hands with some surgical wipes, nodding gratefully at Thomson.

Nobody, least of all the Lieutenant himself, could have predicted just how much Carl cared that Beth was safe. She and Mick were escorted home by two very subdued officers. A new TAC squad was outside the house. Carl tried to explain - Josh might have been the ultimate target, but there was no question that Beth had been marked. Word was going to get out that she'd been involved in taking down Bustos and Puerta, he still wanted some detail at the house. She just made him promise that everyone would stay outside and they acquiesced gratefully.

--

Mick steeled himself as Beth shut the porch door behind her. Carl didn't waste much time. A quick discussion with the new squad and then he was standing in front of Mick his head nodding slightly in a particularly disturbing manner.

"You always around when death comes knocking, St John?"

"Lately, that's all it feels like."

"So, just two with guns this time, eh? Easier than the last one; six with guns _and_ machetes."

Mick felt the first pricklings of fear in his stomach. "Apparently my guardian angel works weekends and overtime," he said lightly.

Carl smiled a little at that. "And man, you and Beth don't have much luck with lovers. She stabs yours, hers gets shot..."

Mick moved so fast Carl half-thought he dreamed it. Only the creased shirtfront and the crumpled tie sat in smug evidence.

"Now how did you do that, St John?" he asked softly.

Mick turned away, pressing the tingling fingers together; Carl's silver necklace had burned even through the layers of cloth. "I took a lot of martial arts."

"And medical training?"

"Some."

"The medics seemed impressed."

"Yeah? Maybe they should take some driving lessons. If they'd gotten there a minute or two earlier..." Mick looked up at the house suddenly, at the crack in the blinds where a fist clung tight, and he willed all his senses to dull.

Carl watched him intently. Oh, not the hots at all. From Morgan's beside at the hospital three weeks ago to the park, somewhere along the way, the PI had fallen and fallen hard.

"You're going to need a statement," Mick said flatly, turning back to face Carl.

The detective raised his eyebrows. "You mean you're not going to vanish for two days and put my job in jeopardy this time?" At least the guy had the grace to look momentarily surprised.

"I'm sorry, man. I didn't-.... No," Mick continued. "Not two days. I want in on this. I'm a witness and you can use that information in the interrogation room." He turned back to face the house briefly. "Beth can corroborate anything I say later."

"OK."

Mick looked at him suspiciously. Relief was pouring off the detective. "I just need to make one stop first."

"Going home to get cleaned up?"

"Just gonna grab a change of clothes." Home, morgue. Cleaned up, get blood. Same difference. He'd just button his jacket and nobody would notice a thing.

"Do not make me wait more than an hour."

Carl was still watching as Mick drove away.

With sunglasses on, Mick finally let his eyes vamp out as a measure of relief. And made a mental note to ask Guillermo not to tap whatever was left over in Josh and the dead cop for food; it was the least he could do.

No regrets. He knew beyond any doubt that there were no regrets over his refusal. The Vampire snarled: _Death comes to all. There will be no Turnings without consent._ The rest of him wondered if Beth had wanted to die instead. If she had looked at Josh and thought, 'It was supposed to be me.' …All the cards that she had gambled today: one man traded for the other, one life traded for the other, one parody of existence that was nearly traded for love.

He'd worn so much blood today – Coraline's and Josh's. And almost Beth's. A split second slower and shards of brain and bone would have decorated his shirt as well.

It buzzed like a refrain in his head, and he worried at it like a dog, trying to tear a hole in its smug condemnation. _Almost-Beth, almost-Beth, almost-Beth._ It sang in his engine, in the rattling of a loosening hubcap, in the swish of cars passing him, the human hearts pumping on the streets, it blew into his mind with the memory of glass shards in her elbow, all the way downtown.

--

_It wasn't my fault_, Beth told herself over and over, the words ringing in a hollow litany. She froze as the front door slid shut behind her; the empty apartment was full of memories whispering urgently from the corners. Fleetingly, the thought crossed her mind that this was how it must be for Mick, to see the past everywhere you went and be helpless against it. Then she forced him from her mind, focusing only on avoiding anything that had touched Josh's living body in the last twenty-four hours. She wanted to shower, but the crumpled bedclothes from this morning forced her back to the kitchen. She couldn't face the couch or the armchairs. His coffee cup was still in the sink. She turned and turned, looking for a Beth-place, _any_ Josh-less space.

The grief finally drove her to the windows from which she'd last seen him smiling up at her, ugly, wracking sobs that startled her with their vehemence. Mid-afternoon sunlight filtered lazily through the gap in the blinds where her fingers twisted it in a death-grip. She rocked harder against the wall, oblivious to the rattling blinds and her own sobbing.

The first in a series of calls startled her out of her trance. She stilled gently, wondering too late if the phone should have been switched off. She contemplated taking the house phone off the hook, switching her cell phone off, but sat quietly instead. Carl would panic if the phones didn't ring.

Maureen called. Marissa called. Carter called. More people called. Beth ignored them all. The wood floor was warm and comforting; it smelled of dust. Josh had never smelled like dust. Not yet, but he would. The thought set her crying again. He had been happy, successful, brave, and she had killed him. How was it she could persuade Josh into dying for her but not Mick into bringing Josh back to life? Did she not beg hard enough? Did Mick not see it?

The voices ringing out on the answering machine blended into a vicious pantomime: Honey, take all the time you need. Let us know if there's anything we can do; Oh my God, Beth. I just saw the report. Are you OK? What happened?; Beth, I just heard. God, I swear we'll get this guy; Beth, I just heard...; Beth, how are you?; Beth, is there anything...; Beth, do you want...; Beth, should I...?

"...Beth, I just saw it on the news. I'm so sorry!" the voice was saying. It was soft and sweet, and Beth raised her head like a wounded animal glimpsing shelter. "I know I never met him and I know you said things were iffy, but I hope you're safe."

She stumbled towards the phone. _This one will understand._

"If you ever need someone to talk to or if there's anything I can do to help-"

Beth lifted the receiver and managed just, "Audrey," before tears overwhelmed her again.


End file.
